514 



Fishery Bulletin 93(3), 1995 



B 



Figure 6 



Field-collected (A) gulf flounder, Paralichthys albigutta, 7.1 mm SL; (B) southern flounder, 

 P. lethostigma, 8.4 mm SL. 



other specimen (6.2 mm SL), had 12 postanal mel- 

 anophores along the ventral midline. One melano- 

 phore occurred on the lateral portion of the caudal 

 area. We considered these specimens to be P. squa- 

 milentus because they were well developed for their 

 size compared with P. dentatus (Fahay, 1983). Ap- 

 proximately 64 dorsal rays and 55 anal rays were 

 formed. Neither the dorsal nor anal fins were com- 

 pletely formed. One specimen had four well-defined 

 cranial spines and five preopercle spines. The other 

 specimen had three cranial spines and five preopercle 

 spines. Both specimens had 40 vertebrae. 



Discussion 



Paralichthys larvae can be separated from other 

 bothid larvae by ventral midline pigment and the 

 caudal formula when the principal caudal rays are 

 formed (Fahay, 1983). Paralichthys dentatus and, 



tentatively, P. squamilentus larvae can be separated 

 from P. albigutta and P. lethostigma larvae by differ- 

 ences in postanal ventral midline pigment (Fig. 7) 

 and in size at development. Paralichthys dentatus 

 has a maximum of 13 postanal melanophores along 

 the ventral midline that are not uniform in size or 

 spacing (Smith and Fahay, 1970). Tentatively, P. 

 squamilentus has ventral midline pigment similar 

 to P. dentatus. Paralichthys albigutta and P. letho- 

 stigma have approximately 19-31 postanal ventral 

 midline melanophores that are uniform in size and 

 spacing (Fig. 7). Larval P. dentatus can tentatively 

 be separated from larval P. squamilentus by differ- 

 ences in development. At any given size, P. squa- 

 milentus appears to be significantly more developed 

 than the other three Paralichthys species. However, 

 early preflexion larvae might be difficult to separate 

 from P. dentatus because P. squamilentus has only 

 been tentatively described from two postflexion speci- 

 mens (this study). On the other hand, at any given 



