FISHERY BULLETIN: VOL. 75, NO. 3 



her saddle during a rush may have functioned as a 

 type of response, communicating to the male her 

 receptivity and possibly her altering physiological 



state. 



Once the first and subsequent daily spawnings 

 began, it appeared that the female now set the 

 tempo for synchronizing the events leading to 

 spawning. The first "signal" that spawning was 

 imminent occurred when the female's caudal 

 stripe or checkerboard pattern was consistently 

 maintained, followed by a further broadening and 

 blanching of her saddle. Then, once her pectoral 

 swimming, the tail lift, and head-down behaviors 

 were sustained, the female initiated the final 

 courtship behavior (i.e., runs). Even though the 

 male synchronized his movements with hers, the 

 pace and completion of the runs and upward 

 spawning motion were contingent on the female's 

 actions. 



The separate behavioral components of the 

 courtship and spawning repertoire in the tautog 

 reflect both similarities and differences when 

 compared with other labrid groups. In the clean- 

 ing wrasse, Labroides phthirophagus, pair forma- 

 tion and courtship precede spawning by at least a 

 week or more (Youngbluth 1968). During this 

 time the male repeatedly performs rapid ap- 

 proaches ("passes") towards the side of the female 

 which she tolerates; however, the male's action in 

 this case is generally also accompanied by a body 

 quivering. In some species the only vigorous ap- 

 proaches by males toward females are described as 

 chases, such as in the four Halichoeres species 

 observed by Randall and Randall (1963); the cun- 

 ner, Tautogolabrus adspersus (Wicklund 1970); 

 Thalassoma bifasciatum (Randall and Randall 

 1963); and T. lunare (Robertson and Choat 1974). 

 In Cirrhilabrus temminckii the male performs a 

 single rushing action similar to the tautog, but 

 this only occurs immediately prior to the upward 

 darting for gamete release (Moyer and Shepard 

 1975). 



In many of the species described above, the 

 males also perform ritualized swimming patterns 

 or displays to attract the females. These have been 

 described as circling, looping, fluttering, dancing, 

 or simply courtship swimming. The responses of 

 females among the various species can vary from a 

 simple approach such as in T. bifasciatum (Rein- 

 both 1973) to an over, reciprocal response such as 

 "sigmoid posturing" and "dancing" as in L. 

 phthirophagus (Youngbluth 1968), or a lateral ap- 

 proach to the male in which the swollen flank and 



genital papilla are presented as in Crenilabrus 

 melops (Potts 1974). 



With the exception of C. melops which spawn on 

 the sand in a nest, all of the other species men- 

 tioned above and tautog share a common mode of 

 swimming or darting rapidly upwards to spawn. 

 Body bending (only by the male of a pair) in T. 

 bifasciatum has been observed by Reinboth ( 1973) 

 as well as the brief alignment of the pair's genital 

 openings. 



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 



We thank Anne L. Studholme, Allen J. Bejda, 

 and A. Dale Martin for their valuable assistance 

 throughout all phases of the study. Illustrations of 

 the spawning act, taken from motion picture films, 

 were expertly done by Carol Gene Schleifer. We 

 also thank Myron Silverman for his assistance in 

 photographing the fish. 



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