704 



Fishery Bulletin 9I|4), 1993 



sled samples at the inner shelf and was also abundant 

 in stomach samples but demonstrated negative elec- 

 tivity at the inner (£=-0.53) and outer (£=-0.39) shelf 

 sites. At the middle shelf, L. faxoni was the most abun- 

 dant species in the analyzed taxa in fish stomachs and 

 ranked third in abundance in sled samples. Many of 

 the species that were high in relative abundance in 

 fish stomachs also occurred in sled samples; however, 

 electivity values were not always positive. The rela- 

 tive abundance of cumaceans, mysids, stomatopods, 

 and decapods in fish stomachs, compared with their 

 abundance in sled samples, indicated that vermilion 

 snapper often selected crustaceans in higher propor- 

 tions than was their availability to the plankton sled 

 at night (Table 4). Included were several orders of Crus- 

 tacea, particularly the cumacean Oxyurostylis smithi 

 and the mysid Promysis atlantica at inner shelf sta- 

 tions, the decapods Lucifer faxoni and Leptochela 

 papulata at middle shelf stations, and the decapods 



Leptochela papulata and Solenocera atlantidis at the 

 outer shelf. 



Comparing dominant species in the diet of vermil- 

 ion snapper with their relative abundance in benthic 

 (lower half of Table 3) and sled (lower half of Table 4) 

 samples indicated high positive selectivity for most prey 

 species from both environments sampled. For suction 

 and grab samples, this was due to the extremely low 

 abundance (<19() of all the dominant prey in the 

 benthos. For the sled samples, many dominant prey 

 species were also dominant in the environment. 



Discussion 



The vermilion snapper is well adapted to foraging in 

 the water column (Davis and Birdsong, 1973; Grimes, 

 1979). Grimes (1979) reported that the diet of vermil- 

 ion snapper was dominated by planktonic organisms 



