340 DISCOVERY REPORTS 



With reference to the occasional dominance of FurciHa 6 in Weddell East that persists throughout 

 September and October, it will be seen on closer inspection of Fig. 95 that not infrequently the 

 young swarms there, whether purely larval or both larval and adolescent, are younger, sometimes 

 conspicuously younger,^ than many that are encountered at much the same time, or even up to a 

 month or more earlier, in the more westerly parts of the current. Thus the Weddell East swarm at 

 Station 2406 on 22 August is substantially younger than any of the three swarms recorded in Weddell 

 West and Weddell Middle from 10 to 12 July, and the swarms at Stations 2405, 2406 and 2412 on 

 21, 22 and 24 August younger than the majority of those recorded on the South Georgia 

 whaling grounds at approximately the same time. Again the Weddell East swarms at Stations 2443 

 and 2445 in late September and at Station 2447 in early October are conspicuously younger than those 

 recorded from Weddell Middle, Weddell West and the South Georgia whaling grounds a few days 

 later, and substantially younger than those encountered earlier on the South Georgia whaling grounds 

 and in Weddell West from 4 to 19 September. The occasional persistence of the Sixth Furcilia in 

 Weddell East as a substantial or even dominant component of the young winter and spring swarms 

 can be traced up to the end of October and into November and, if the ' Terje Viken ' stomach records 

 (p. 138) be taken into account, until the second half of December. There is a conspicuously young 

 Weddell East swarm, for instance, at Station 2475 on the last day of October and another, less con- 

 spicuous, at Station 2478 in early November. 



It seems that this persistently recurring phenomenon must be associated in the main with the late 

 risings that take place in Weddell Middle, risings it will be recalled (p. 313, Fig. 76) which result 

 in the arrival of a young Calyptopis population in Weddell East as late as the middle of April. It 

 must be associated, too, with the late risings that occasionally, although apparently rarely (p. 314), 

 take place in Weddell East itself, such as that for instance recorded (see again Fig. 76) at Station 

 2346 in late April. 



Finally, although it has already been stated that the Sixth Furcilia becomes very scarce in the latter 

 half of November we have recorded late in that month, at Station WS 488 in the Bransfield Strait, 

 one instance (Fig. 95) where it has in fact persisted as the dominant stage. This is perhaps not 

 surprising, for in November in this southern channel, from which the ice has so recently cleared 

 away, the conditions, in so far as surface temperature goes (p. 82, Table 8), approximate closely to 

 those of the higher latitudes of the East Wind drift, where as already noted (p. 286, note i) the Sixth 

 Furcilia may survive over December into March of the following year.- 



The principal facts then relating to the distribution of the late Furcilias, a composite view of which 

 is given in Fig. 96,^ may be summarised as follows: 



(i) The vertical net is not a very efficient sampler oflhese stages because of their intense surface 

 crowding and while it provides useful information as to the limits of their distribution, an adequate 

 idea of their relative abundance can only be provided by the stramin nets. 



(2) They first appear in the latter part of March in Weddell West, spreading into the western part 

 of Weddell Middle by April. In May and June they are probably spread across the whole of Weddell 

 West and Weddell Middle in large numbers. In Weddell East, however, although small, for the most 



^ Perhaps after 'younger' I should add 'or if not younger, conspicuously more backward in development'. 



^ See also, however, p. 368. 



' In view of the poor sampling power of the vertical net when used for the capture of these stages the insignificant catches 

 from May (excepting May in the East Wind drift) to November have been regarded as having some significance and have 

 been plotted as such in Fig. 96. In May and June, however, in Weddell East they may, as suggested in (2) above, have 

 been given rather more significance than perhaps they deserve. The June West Wind occurrences north of the Balleny 

 Islands and north-east of Peter 1 Island, although meagrely represented (p. 335) in the vertical nets, have been taken 

 from the more substantial stramin net gatherings. 



