470 



FISHERY BULLETIN OP THE FISH AND WILDLIFE SERVICE 



Following the coast we find them reported at 

 Truro, Cape Cod; Prof. A. E. Gross has informed 

 us that he often saw as many as a dozen sea 

 robins taken in the trap at the entrance to Barn- 

 stable Harbor in a single tide in the early summer 

 of 1920; 96 one now in the Museum of Compara- 

 tive Zoology was trawled 12 to 15 miles off 

 Plymouth, at 30 fathoms, on November 20, 1943; 

 the sea robin has been reported off Lynn and 

 Salem; and in 1913 Welsh saw several in a trap 

 at Manchester, on the North Shore of Massa- 

 chusetts Bay on June 29. North of Cape Ann 

 it has been taken at Anisquam; at Newburyport 

 at the mouth of the Merrimac River, whence 

 one about 1 foot long was brought in to the 

 Museum of Comparative Zoology on August 14, 

 1949; also at the mouth of the Saco River. And 

 Dr. W. C. Kendall saw more than 25 taken 

 from the traps near Small Point, Casco Bay, 

 between July 4 and 14 in 1896. 



The only records for it for the coast east of 

 Small Point are, however, for a single specimen 

 caught at Campobello Island in the mouth of the 

 Bay of Fundy in August 1911, and another in 

 August 1949, 66 one taken in a weir in Passama- 

 quoddy Bay at St. Andrews, October 2, 1935," 

 and of another taken in the Bay of Fundy, near 

 Minas Channel, during the late summer or early 

 autumn of 1951. M 



Enough sea robins also range eastward across 

 the South Channel for trawlers to have picked up 

 a few (never more than a dozen or two on a trip) 



« Briefly mentioned in The Auk, vol. 40, No. I, January 1923, p. 24. 



on Georges Bank during the summer of 1913. 

 But it is probable that the deep channel between 

 Georges and Browns Banks form its easterly 

 limit, for sea robins are not known on Browns 

 Bank or off the west coast of Nova Scotia. 



It is not hkely that the sea robin ever suc- 

 ceeds in reproducing itself in the Gulf, unless in 

 restricted localities such as Casco Bay, where 

 summer temperatures may be high enough. 

 We have never taken its rather characteristic 

 eggs in our tow nets anywhere in the Gulf, nor 

 have its young fry ever been reported there. 

 But when wandering fish do find their way 

 around Cape Cod from the south, they may re- 

 main there, wintering offshore in deeper water, 

 as they do farther south. 



Importance. — The sea robin is edible, and its 

 near relatives, the gurnards, are table fish in 

 Europe, but it is too scarce in the Gulf of Maine 

 to be of any potential commercial importance 

 there. Off southern New England, where it is 

 abundant, it is a nuisance to anglers, taking bait 

 planned for other fishes. 



Striped sea robin Prionotus evolans (Linnaeus) 

 1766 



Jordan and Evermann, 1896-1900, p. 2167, as Prionotus 

 strigatus Cuvier and Valenciennes, 1829 6 ' 



" This latter flsh was reported by Scattergood, Trefethen, and Coffin 

 (Copela, 1951, No. 4, p. 298). 



*> McGoniglo and Smith, Proc. Nova Scotian Inst. Scl., vol. 19, 1936, p. 160. 



« Reported to us by letter by Dr. Huntsman. 



• Oinsberg (Texas Jour. Sci., vol. 2, No. 4, 1950, p. 619, 620- 522) has shown 

 that the P. strigatus of Cuvier and Valenciennes Is not separable from the 

 evola nsot Linnaeus. 



Figure 246. — Striped sea robin (Prionotus evolans), Woods Hole, Mass. From Goode. Drawing by H. L. Todd. 



