38 Papers from the Department of Marine Biology. 



there was no outward sign save for a fine aldermanic curve in the 

 abdominal region. The escape overboard of the little fish in the trans- 

 fer to my bucket forestalled the taking of any measurements. The 

 fishermen (men in whom I have large confidence) told me that towards 

 the close of a haul they had noticed one big catfish and a number of 

 little ones swimming around in the net. The little ones got away 

 but the big one was hastily secured and in his mouth was found the 

 4-inch young one referred to. A little catfish in this stage of devel- 

 opment is portrayed in figure 12, plate iv. 



In this connection the following incident may be related, the narrator 

 being long and favorably known to me. Mr. T. E. Adair says that 

 in the early nineties, he and his brother Charles were seining one day 

 off the mouth of Wading Creek in Newport River, when their seine 

 brought in a number of gaff-topsails. These spat out a lot of young 

 some 2.5 or 3 inches long "with a great big yolk dividing the little 

 fish in two." Then he 'and his brother both distinctly saw the old one 

 open his mouth and the little ones swim into it. He then "took up 

 the big one and poured out a double handful of young ones." 



In the section on size of mouth cavity, it was stated that 5 casts had 

 been made but only 4 were described ; the fifth cast was that of the 

 mouth of the 18-inch male brooding 21 larva? as previously noted (p. 37) . 

 The volumetric displacement of one of these larvae, for which measure- 

 ments have been made, was 4 c.c. That of a slightly smaller one was 3 

 c.c. scant. Thus the total volume of the 21, if they averaged 4 c.c., 

 would be 84 c.c., or if 5 c.c., only 105 c.c., while the capacity of the 

 mouth as shown by the plaster cast was 120 c.c. 



In intimate relation with the number of eggs and young carried by 

 an adult male is the question of how many eggs an adult female may 

 extrude. The largest number of eggs gotten is 55 from the mouth of 

 a 22-inch male. Only one adult female has ever been spawned. 

 This fish is merely noted in my records as being very large (probably 

 about the size of the male above) and from her were obtained 68 eggs. 

 Whatever the facts for smaller fish, it would seem that the largest 

 male does not carry in his great buccal cavity as many eggs as the 

 largest adult female can produce. From which it seems probable that 

 the fish are polyandrous as well as polygamous. 



The data at hand indicate that not all the ova extruded are fertil- 

 ized, and it is quite probable that all the eggs fertilized are not hatched, 

 and that all the young hatched are not matured. However, it would 

 seem from my experiments that, when once the eggs are fertilized, the 

 mortality in the paternal mouth is far less than in the best-regulated 

 hatching- jars. Considerable data on this point have been previously 

 given (Gudger, 1916). 



