486 



FISHERY BULLETIN OF THE FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE 



Goode and Bean as naucrateoides) ; and for a third 

 reported by Goode and Bean 22 as taken at the 

 mouth of the Merrimac River in June 1870. And 

 Leim 23 reports one from Halifax Harbor, Nova 

 Scotia, during the fall of 1928. It is only as the 

 rarest of strays that it ever wanders north of Cape 

 Cod, clinging to some ship (for such is a common 

 habit in its tropical home) or to some shark. 



Swordfish sucker 



Remora brachyptera (Lowe) 

 1839 24 



Jordan and Evermann, 1896-1900, p. 2272 



Description. — This is a stouter fish than the 

 shark sucker (p. 485), being only about seven times 

 as long as it is deep (counting the caudal fin) and 

 about as thick through the shoulders as it is deep, 

 with a thicker caudal peduncle. And although 

 the sucking plate is as long, relatively, it consists 

 of only 14 to 17 ridges. Furthermore, the pectoral 

 fins of the swordfish sucker are relatively shorter 

 than those of the shark sucker, softer, and rounded 

 instead of pointed, while the upper margins of 

 these fins are not so close to the edge of the sucking 

 plate. The ventral fins, too, are attached to the 

 skin of the abdomen along their inner margins for 

 at least one-half their length, as noted above 

 (p. 485). The long dorsal fin (29 to 32 rays) of the 



« Bull. Essex Inst., vol. 11, 1S79, p. 20. 

 23 Proc. Nova Scotiau Inst. Sci., vol. 17, No. 4, 1930, p, xlvi. 

 » Jordan, Evermann, and Clark (Rept. U. S. Comm. Fisb. (1928), Pt. 2, 

 1930, p. 449) place this species in the genus Remoropsis Gill, 1864. 



swordfish sucker serves to separate it from the 

 remora (p. 487). 



Color. — Described as light reddish brown above 

 and as darker below, with paler dorsal and anal 

 fins. A distinctive feature is that it lacks the side 

 stripes and white fin edgings so characteristic of 

 the shark sucker. 



Size. — A length of 12 inches is the maximum so 

 far recorded. 



General range. —Warm and warm-temperate seas 

 generally, probably paralleling that of the sword- 

 fish. 



Occurrence in the Gulj of Maine. — Goode and 

 Bean's 25 description of this sucker as not infre- 

 quently accompanying swordfish into Massa- 

 chusetts Bay probably applies to the whole Gulf 

 except the Bay of Fundy, for specimens have been 

 brought in from near Matinicus Rock and near 

 the Isles of Shoals; fishermen occasionally speak 

 of seeing "suckers" clinging to the swordfish they 

 harpoon on the offshore Banks; sometimes several 

 fastened to a single swordfish. But they also 

 report far more swordfish lacking these uninvited 

 guests than carrying them, and this has been the 

 case with the few fish harpooned by the Grampus 

 during our cruises in the Gulf. Suckers are de- 

 scribed by eyewitnesses as usually fast to the 

 shoulder of the swordfish, nor have we heard of one 

 actually within the gill cover of the latter, though 

 very likely they refuge there, for one has been 



" Bull. Esesex Inst., vol. 11, 1879, p. 21. 



Figure 252. — Swordfish sucker (.Remora brachyptera), 

 side view and top of head (below), off Halifax, Nova 

 Scotia. From Jordan and Evermann. Drawings by H. 

 L. Todd. 



