FISHERY BULLETIN: VOL. 73, NO. 4 



water fishes with respect to time and space, and 

 possible variations in feeding cycles, the present 

 collections are not ideal in all respects. The study 

 did include representatives of most of the major 

 groups of common mesopelagic fishes from a 

 variety of depths and times, and the results may 

 be expected to be broadly applicable to many mid- 

 water environments. Considering the simul- 

 taneous time-depth collections with the double 

 trawl of both "control" fish and those with the 

 opportunity to ingest food in the cod end, this 

 study provides the first reasonably good test of net 

 feeding in mesopelagic fishes. The relatively small 

 differences in the mean number and taxonomic 

 composition of prey items in most sets of stomachs 

 are encouraging. The results presented here sug- 

 gest that the published literature on the diets of 

 mesopelagic fishes is not seriously biased by net 

 feeding and that existing collections can be used 

 for trophic investigations. 



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 



We acknowledge with pleasure contributions to 

 this work by R. C. Beckett of the Naval Research 

 Laboratory and E. E. Gallaher, D. M. Milliken, 

 J. K. Rolfes, and W. R. Weiss of the University of 

 South Florida. Critical review was provided by D. 

 F. Wilson, B. J. Zahuranec, and C. Woodhouse. 

 Support was received from the State University 

 System Institute of Oceanography (Florida), the 

 Naval Research Laboratory and Environmental 

 Protection Agency contract No. 5444 and NSF 

 Grant DES- 75-03845. 



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