5o8 Memoir Sears Foundation for Marine Research 



white markings farther forward. While these pale patches appear to be normal in some 

 cases, they may be accidental in others, for the dark superficial pigmentation is easily 

 rubbed off. Outer (morphologically upper) surfaces of cephalic fins of same general color 

 as back, shading to slate gray along edges. Lower surface, including inner (morpholog- 

 ically lower) surfaces of cephalic fins, white, either plain or with the abdomen irregularly 

 and vaguely blotched with slaty gray or even black; margins of pectorals more or less 

 widely edged with gray; mouth surrounded by a vaguely outlined band of the same 

 dark hue. 



An 1 1 foot 5 inch specimen, recently examined by us, was bluish slate above on 

 disc and tail; dorsal fin edged with violet brown; outer faces of cephalic fins dark gray; 

 lower surfaces of pectorals bluish gray around outer and posterior margins, but anterior 

 margin narrowly edged with light gray; lower side of inner parts of pectorals and trunk, 

 as a whole, pure white but marked with a large bluish gray blotch crossing the gill 

 openings on each side; also four other dark gray blotches, of different sizes, irregularly 

 arranged on abdomen; pelvics bluish gray toward tips; tail white close behind cloaca 

 but gray thence rearward; lower tooth band white; inner parts of mouth, including gill 

 sieve, dark gray. 



A small one, observed in the aquarium at Bimini, showed some diurnal change in 

 coloration; a pale patch appeared at night on each of the pectorals, which were uniformly 

 dark by day.^^* 



Size. A male 1 1 feet 5 inches wide was still immature, as shown by its small 

 claspers which were a little short of the tips of the pelvics. But embryos have been found 

 in females 14-15 feet wide, making it likely that it matures when it has grown to such 

 a size. Commonly it reaches a breadth of 15-19 feet. One 19 feet 8 inches wide was 

 reported recently oft" the mouth of the Mississippi, 1*' one 21 feet 2 inches wide off 

 New Jersey (see Study Material, p. 502), and one 2 2 feet wide and 1 7 feet long, evidently 

 with tail damaged, was killed near Bimini in the Bahamas. i" A specimen 14 feet wide 

 and 7 feet from front of head to base of tail weighed 1,686 pounds, and a female 1 8 feet 

 wide, from the Galapagos Islands, weighed 2,310 pounds. 1** The reported weight of 

 3,502 pounds for one 20 feet wide, taken many years ago at La Guayra, Venezuela, 

 may not have been exaggerated, for the weight of the 22-foot Bahaman monster 

 mentioned previously was above the limit of a commercial scale that weighed to 3,000 

 pounds. 



Embryos, reported up to 50 inches wide, weighed 20 pounds or more.^*" But some 

 are born while somewhat smaller than that, for free-living specimens have been reported 

 as small as four feet wide.^^i 



146. Breder, Bull. Amer. Mus. nat. Hist., 94 {2), 1949: 89. 



147. Gowanloch, Bull. La. Conserv. Dep., 23, 1933: 241. 



148. For account of the capture and size of this monster, with photographs, see La Gorce (Nat. geogr. Mag., 3$, 1919: 

 483-488), and Townsend (Bull. N. Y. zool. Soc, 22, 1919: 140). 



149. Beebe and Tee-Van, Zoologica N. Y., 26, 1941 : 275. 



150. Miiller and Henle (Plagiost, 1841: 187); Giinther (Cat. Fish. Brit. Mus., S, 1870: 498). The 18-foot Galapagos 

 Mania mentioned above contained an embryo 45 inches wide weighing 28 pounds. 



151. Near the Grenadines, Lesser Antilles (Beebe and Hollister, Zoologica N. Y., Jp, 1935: 209). Henshall also reported 



