FISHERY BULLETIN VOL. 



juveniles were taken in the Middle Atlantic Bight 

 from late fall to June. 



In the winter survey, a few juveniles were taken 

 off Florida (Figure 7). but during a follow-up 

 cruise, none were caught (Figure 8f). 



DISCUSSION 



The patterns of distribution of young stages of 

 bluefish off the east coast can be summarized 

 based on our collections and those of others (Table 

 5). 



From our collections of small larvae, bluefish 

 appear to spawn in two quite different areas — in 

 water just shoreward of the Gulf Stream (Florida 

 Current) from Florida to Cape Hatteras, i.e., the 

 South Atlantic Bight, and in shelf water from 

 Cape Hatteras to Cape Cod, i.e., the Middle Atlan- 

 tic Bight. 



In the South Atlantic Bight, spawning occurs 

 primarily during spring and apparently also to a 

 lesser extent in fall and winter. Most of the larvae 



we caught were well offshorejust shoreward of the 

 Gulf Stream in water which was 20°-26°C and had 

 a salinity of 35-38%o. 



Larvae from the spring spawning in the south- 

 ern area are evidently carried northward past 

 Cape Hatteras in April and May and become 

 spread out along the continental slope off the Mid- 

 dle Atlantic Bight. As shelf waters become suit- 

 ably warm, generally in mid-June, the young 

 bluefish appear to cross the shelf and enter es- 

 tuaries, where they spend the summer. There they 

 grow from 25-50 mm SL to 175-200 mm SL (Wilk 

 see footnote 6) and in early fall migrate south 

 along the coast. 



Larvae from the fall and winter spawning in 

 southern waters may find their way inshore south 

 of Cape Hatteras as indicated by a few juveniles 

 which we found in Florida in winter. 



The spawning in the Middle Atlantic Bight in 

 continental shelf waters occurs in summer. The 

 water in which larvae were found here was 3°C 

 cooler and 5%o less saline than that in the south- 



T.i^BLE 5. — Collections of bluefish eggs, larvae, and juveniles, east coast of United States. 



'Lund, W A . Jr Early life history of the bluelish, I'l 

 Res Lah . Noank, Conn . 23 p 



sntttjtrix ( Linnaeus). (tfT the coast of" New Yurk and southern New Knjiiand, Contrib 64 Mar 



224 



