Date: Sunday f 20, 2012
Ballan Wrass Sea Fish
The "Wrasses form a numerous family, of wliich several species are found on the British coasts, and of these there are some portions of character which are common to all, however they may vary in other particulars. Their residence is among rocks which are clothed with the larger kinds of sea weeds, and not at a great depth of water.
If alarmed, or after wandering for a time in search of food, they return to their accustomed shelter, and as they appear to enjoy the waving of this herbage above their heads among which they are seen passing to and fro, as if rejoicing in the pleasantness of the situation they also find in the concealment it affords a shelter from their enemies, of which they have some formidable ones.
The cormorant and shag can only prey upon the young, but the porpoise and dolphin, with the seal in more solitary places, will hunt them in the gullies of rocks, as I have seen the former do like hounds scenting out a hare, and from them there is small chance of escape.
The ancients entertained the singular opinion that the male Wrasse was the master, keeper, or husband of several females, which he compelled to shut themselves up within some rocky prison, before which his occupation was to maintain over them a jealous watch lest any stranger should break in upon them to invade his rights.
It was only in the evening that this care was intermitted, and only then for a short time, that he might seek a supply of food, the females, on the other hand, being supposed to find sufficient for their need in what their rocky cavern afforded.
In no other way than by enticing this guardian of his flock to take the hook could a fisherman hope to ensnare the females within, but if successful in his first intention, his ultimate wishes were certain to be accomplished. It was then the females range unguarded by their mate. Embrace the fraud, and share the common fate.
Observations such as these can only be supposed the sport of a lively imagination, but it is certain that in ancient times the fishes of this family were more observed, and held in higher estimation than now they are, and, indeed, as food they deserve to be.
Pliny even calls Wrasses Turdi nobiles inter sexatiles noble among fishes that frequent rocks, and Columella appears to give countenance to the same opinion by informing us that they were among the principal which the Romans kept in their salt-water stagna or ponds, and "quarem pretia vigent which sold for a good price, to which Oppian adds his suffrage by calling them delicate Wrasses.
With us they are scarcely thought worthy of the trouble of conveying them to market, their flesh being considered soft and pulpy, without any distinguishing taste, but it is proper we should add, that although the Wrasse is generally as little valued in Ireland as in England, we learn from Mr. Thompson, in his natural history of that country, it is otherwise in Galway, where a regular fishery for taking it is carried on, and it is preferred to most other sorts of fish.
The truth, indeed, appears to lie between the two extremes, for when skilfully cooked it may maintain competition with some kinds that are held in better estimation. Perhaps we may gather from Eondeletius some help that may assist us in explaining this variety of opinion in regard to the estimation in which this and some other fishes have been held as food at one time, and the dislike or neglect shown to them at another.
He remarks that the ancient Romans never ate their fish but with an artificial taste, so that their cooks were accustomed to shew their skill by dressing them with spices, a variety of herbs, and such strange sauces as we have already described. What would have tasted salt was rendered sweet with honey or sugar, and the insipid was highly seasoned.
That which was tasteless was seasoned with onions, leeks, garlic, or omphacium, (a kind of oil or rob from the unripe olive or the grape), and vinegar, and these ingredients were perhaps necessary to render palatable what may have been long out of water in a warm climate. It is a remark sometimes made by our own fishermen that they coidd not eat what of this sort often finds access to a gentleman's table.
The Wrasse is fished for from rocks overhanging the coast, or from boats near sunken rocks and gullies which they are known to frequent, the bait being a worm of the beach, or what is to be preferred, a portion of some sort of crab of which an example that has lately thrown off its covering or crust is the best.
It is on such matters, together with several sorts of shell fish and green sea weeds, that they commonly feed. I have taken the limpet shell Patella) from the stomach. The bait is swallowed eagerly, but when hooked they struggle with much violence.
The beds of pharyngeal teeth, which are situated low down in the gullet, form a remarkable character in this fish, and require to be mentioned as being intimately connected with the nature of its food and its digestion. They are formed of two smaller triangular beds of blunt teeth above, with round tops and planted on a bed of bone, and of a larger triangular bed opposed to them on the under side.
And to render these teeth more firm for the work they have to perform, contrary to the example of teeth in the jaws of fishes, they are implanted in the substance of the bone itself, from which they appear to be renewed when their usefulness is destroyed.
It is a question whether their employment is to act upon the food as it passes into the stomach, or rather that the grinding action is brought to bear upon it when it becomes regurgitated in a manner which bears an analogy to the action of rumination in the ox and sheep. It is a confirmation of this lastnamed opinion that the sea weeds and other matters usually existing in the stomach are found to be in a short time ground into a pulp.
It might be supposed that the arrangement of these guttural teeth would lend assistance in the discrimination of doubtful species in this family, but observation shows that this is liable to some variation, and consequently must not be relied upon.
Fishermen have informed me that when they resort to a new station, it is usual at first to catch a Wrasse one or more of the larger size, and afterwards, on going to the same spot, they find more in number, but of less weight, and from this they have drawn the conclusion that the older fishes had kept the young ones at a distance as long as they were able to retain the dominion.
It may have been some incidents like this which led ancient observers to construct the story we have noticed above, of a tyrant male from which the imprisoned females had been delivered by his death. As the Wrasse is not much sought after by professional fishermen, and for the most is only used as bait for other fish, or for lobsters and crabs, it sometimes lives long enough to show signs of advanced age, the chief of which is partial or utter blindness, and in this condition they occasionally wander until their ill chance leads them to the dangers of the shore.
This defect of sight is sometimes produced by an opaque cloud, which covers the usual transparent cornea of the eye, and at other times it has its seat in the substance of the crystalline lens within, in which case it is the same with what in man is termed the cataract.
The Ballan Wrasse is common on all the coasts of Britain, where the rocky bottom is such as to afford it food and shelter, and it is also found along the western shores of Sweden and Norway. It appears to be less common in the Mediterranean, and Eisso says it is caught at Nice in July, as if it were subject to some periodical movement, which is not the case with us.
The spawn is shed in spring, and the young, of small size, are seen about the borders of rocks, at the ebb of tide, through the summer. The Ballan Wrasse is usually from fourteen to sixteen inches in length, with a weight of seven or eight pounds, and it has been known to reach the length of nearly two feet. The body solid, compressed, moderately deep, the shape sloping gradually from the nape to the point of the upper jaw, which protrudes a little beyond the lower.
The lips fleshy and prominent, the upper more so than the lower, both having raised striated lines. Teeth firm, stout, slightly incurved, regular in the jaw, a double pair, more concealed, separate from each other, in front of the palate, a membranous veil forward in the mouth above and below, the latter occupying the place of the tongue. Jaws extensile.
Nostrils above the line of the eye, a deep depression in front between the eyes. Eyes lateral, prominent. Body covered with oblong scales, the free portion of each clothed with a fine membrane in which the colour resides, the gill covers also have scales, but none on the top of the head or before the eyes. Lateral line gently bent down opposite the termination of the dorsal fin.
This fin begins a little behind the origin of the pectoral, with twenty firm rays, each one tipped with a soft process, the hindmost portion more expanded, having eleven soft rays, pectoral with fifteen, anal having two firm and tipped rays, and ten soft, the two last from one root, ventrals six rays, the first firm, caudal fin thirteen.
Colour lively, but very various in different individuals, the highest brilliancy very soon declining. Iris of the eye crimson, with a dark or purple border. The body yellowish, orange, or golden, back and top of the head brown, whitish or yellow, or mottled with orange on the belly, in some examples a general tendency to green, which is even to be discerned through the flesh.
In the younger specimens there is often a beautiful and varied stripe of lighter colour, with touches of blue and pink, from behind the eye to the tail, sometimes blue spots on the tail fin. In the old individuals almost every scale is marked with a round spot of lighter colour, with a border of red, brown, or orange.
It is probable that in all the Wrasses the teeth are shed with regularity. They are hollow at the root, and, in the Corkwing especially, each one rises through its own membranous sheath to supply the place of another that is about to be thrown off.
The depression referred to between the eyes forms a cavity that accommodates the retracted action of the complicated apparatus which is connected with the motions of the upper jaw, and which are guided by muscles that act through the means of tendons.
A large muscle acts upon the angles of both jaws, to enable them to crush its food, while the curtains which lie across the mouth above and below are supplied with large nerves of sensation, derived from what may be called the facial nerve, and the lowest of the two branches being the largest. The whole structure of these parts points out the existence of a union of much strength with high sensibility of taste and feeling.
There is reason to believe that the Corkling of Jenyns and Yarrell, Lahrus, is only a younger condition of the Ballan Wrasse.
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