THE WEEVEES. 353 



CHAPTER IV. THE WEEYERS. 



These venomous little fishes are a plague on every coast, 

 save that of the United States, where, on the eastern side 

 at any rate, they are unknown. There is in Australian 

 waters a so-called "whiting" which is closely related to 

 these weevers, but it lacks the poisonous spines, gives good 

 sport, and is excellent for the table. 



The Greater Weever is the less formidable, if only that 

 it is not so given to lurking in the sand with its back- 

 Greater fill protruding. It is most abundant on the 

 Weever. southern coasts of these islands, much rarer 

 in the north. Its colour is dark yellow, with lighter lines 

 on the sides, the head streaked or spotted with blue. Of 

 sluggish habits, it feeds at the bottom on cephalopods and 

 small crustaceans. The dorsal spines can inflict a festering 

 wound, but the contact is a chance one ; those on the gill- 

 covers, however, are, in both this and the next species, 

 used intentionally, the fish bending head and tail together 

 and suddenly uncoiling, striking the offending object with 

 wonderful precision. 



The Lesser Weever is not more than half the size of the 

 last; in colour, too, it is somewhat paler, and there is a 

 Lesser conspicuous light band on the tail-fin. This 

 "Weever. little fish is a source of constant danger to 

 the netsmen and of annoyance to the amateur; and I 

 have noticed for years that a number are almost invariably 

 hooked from piers in the summer months during the pre- 

 valence of an east wind. Without being exactly dangerous, 

 a wound from the gill-spines of this fish may cause many 

 days of intense pain. In the Hebrides this fish is regarded 

 as the male of the sand-eel.^ 



1 Harvie-Brown and Buckley, Fauna of the Outer Hebrides, p. 189. 



Z 



