FISHES OF THE GULF OF MAINE 



299 



ing 3 pounds; 31 and 20 inches, weighing 4% 

 pounds and 24 inches, weighing 7 pounds. 32 



Remarks. — The presence of plates along the 

 base of its first (spiny) dorsal fin, as well as along 

 the bases of its second (soft) dorsal and anal fins, 

 and of only three anal spines marks our fish off 

 from its close counterpart, the European John 

 Dory (Zeus faber), which has four stout anal 

 spines and lacks plates along the first dorsal fin. 

 Other structural differences are that the plates are 

 much larger in our species than in the European, 

 but the thorns smaller and less conspicuous ; 33 

 that the base of each of the dorsal fin spines 

 (except for the first and last one or two) is armed 

 in the European species with a stout thorn (not in 

 the American); and that the upper profile of the 

 head is much the more deeply concave in the 

 American species. 



Habits. — All that is known of the habits of our 

 John Dory is that we found two butterfish 6 to 7 

 inches long and one squid in the stomach of a large 

 one (of about 18% in.) trawled by the Albatross III 

 about 74 miles off Long Island, N. Y., May 12, 

 1950, at 72 fathoms; and that the ovaries were well 

 developed with orange colored eggs 1.2 to 1.4 mm. 

 in diameter, in a 20-inch female that we saw 

 trawled between January 27 and February 2 on 

 the outer part of the shelf off Marthas Vineyard. 3 * 



General range. — Outer part of the continental 

 shelf from the latitude of Chesapeake Bay to the 

 vicinity of Sable Island, Nova Scotia, and perhaps 

 to the Laurentian Channel that separates the Nova 



Scotian Banks from the Newfoundland Banks. It 

 reaches the inner parts of the Gulf of Maine now 

 and then as a stray. 



Occurrence in the Gulj oj Maine. — Only four 

 specimens are known to have been taken in the 

 inner parts of the Gulf of Maine. One (the speci- 

 men from which the species was described) was 

 found at Provincetown, at the tip of Cape Cod 

 many years ago; one found in a herring weir 

 at Campobello Island, New Brunswick, at the 

 mouth of the Bay of Fundy in 1942; 3S one 

 trawled 25 miles off Cape Ann in 75 fathoms, 

 January 1948. 38 One also was trawled on the 

 northeastern edge of Georges Bank in the summer 

 of 1941, 37 and one taken in Cape Cod Bay, July 

 7, 1952, by the dragger Santina. 



It is to be expected anywhere along the seaward 

 slope of the offshore rim of the Gulf, for the dragger 

 Eugene H took them in nearly every trawl haul on 

 the southwest slope of Georges Bank, near Veatch 

 Canyon, at about the 75-fathom contour line, in 

 late March 1951, some hauls bringing in several 

 hundred (estimated) specimens. Other speci- 

 mens 38 have been trawled recently on the outer 

 part of the continental shelf southeast of Cape 

 Henry, Va., from between 28 and 50 fathoms; 39 

 off Long Island, New York, in 72 fathoms and 

 from between 145 and 200 fathoms; off Marthas 

 Vineyard in 55 to 68 fathoms; off Nantucket in 

 66 to 75 fathoms; on Emerald Bank off Halifax, 

 Nova Scotia, in 70 fathoms; and west of Sable 

 Island, Nova Scotia, at 62 fathoms. 



GRAMMICOLEPID FISHES. FAMILY GRAMMIGOLEPIDAE 



Grammicolepid Xenolepidichthys americanus 

 Nichols and Firth 1939 



Nichols and Firth, Proc, Biol. Soc, Washington, vol. 52, 

 1939, pp. 85-88. 



Description. — This curious little oceanic fish 

 resembles its near relative the John Dory (p. 297) 

 in the arrangement of its fins, and in general shape, 

 with body so strongly flattened sidewise as to be 

 as thin as a pancake, and with a slender caudal 

 peduncle. But it has a much smaller mouth 



•' Caught on the northeast edge of Georges Bank In the summer of 1941 and 

 reported In the Boston Traveler for September 9 of that year. 



» Taken 85 miles off Marthas Vineyard by the dragger Eugene H, May 18, 

 1960. 



J> Double and sometimes triple In the European 7. faber. 



" Trawled by the dragger Eugene H from between 65-68 fathoms. 



than the John Dory, its scales are linear in shape 

 with their long axis dorso-ventral, so that the sides 

 of the trunk are cross marked with a large number 

 of narrow lines, closely crowded together, and 

 the series of bony plates that arm the dorsal 

 and ventral edge of the body of the John Dory 

 are replaced in the Grammicolepids by a double 

 series of short thorns that embrace the bases of the 

 dorsal and ventral fins. Each side of the trunk 

 of the only species known from our waters is 



M Reported to us, with a photograph, by Dr. A. H. Leim. 



» This specimen, trawled by the Agatha and Patricia, Is In the Museum 

 of Comparative Zoology. 



« Reported in the Boston Traveler for September 9, 1941. 



" Specimens seen by us or reliably reported. 



» Reported by Firth, Copeia, 1931, p. 162. 



• For a recent account of this family see Myers, Proc, V. 8. National 

 Museum, vol. 84, 1937, pp. 145-166. 



