1012 



Fishery Bulletin 97(4), 1999 



Female 



Male 



n = 14 



at n t^ 



« a a 



-1 —  — 1 — I 



5 » 



n =16 



O) n r«- 



<N N c? PI 5 ■* 



<N n en 



Ol (O T«- 



tN CM 



R a 



n It 



4 • 

 



n =18 



m, — fB, — ^ 



n =9 



O) r) r- 



« S a f; ; « 



o> P> 1^ 



« R S ft 5 !« 



n n ■^ 



12 



« a a ft 5 « 



oi n f^ 



12 



fi R a ft 



en n r^ »- 



ui en n ^^ ^- in 



oj rj n n ^ ^ 



n =7 



o> n r^ 



oi (O n ■v ^ 



n =36 



I W , r- 



9 



CT) n r^ 





Total length (cm) 



Figure 11 



Length-frequency distributions for female and male winter flounder in the Navesink River estuary, plotted by 

 field station. 



the same may occur with winter flounder. On the 

 other hand, most fertihzation by small males may 

 occur during group spawning. "Sneaking," whereby 

 subordinate males approach and fertilize some of the 

 eggs when a pair is spawning, is a reproductive behav- 



ior common in a variety of fishes (Chan and Ribbink, 

 1990; Oliviera and Almada, 1998 ). We observed no overt 

 agonistic behavior in our long-term experiment, and 

 there is no reason to believe that small males do not 

 contribute to the reproductive population. 



