COASTAL FISH 



143 



absent from the tropical continental shelf. The high temperature has 

 barred their distribution there, whereas forms which have sought the 

 depths have been able to spread along the continental slope. Of the many 

 forms, of which a number are widely distributed, it must suffice to 

 mention the small Tripterophycis gilchristi, which is about 20 centimetres 

 long and is the only cod-fish with three dorsal fins and one anal fin. Of 

 this fish, which had previously been known only from the Cape and 

 Indonesia, we caught 26 specimens off Durban and 10 off Tasmania 

 (Fig. p. 142). 



Antipodocottus galatheae, the only known, true bullhead in the southern hemisphere. 



Of the scorpion-fishes (Scorpcenidce), which were so prominent over 

 the continental shelf, few have ventured into deep water. Altogether, we 

 caught four species belonging to three genera, the deepest being at about 

 1,300 metres off Dakar in West Africa. Some occur in considerable num- 

 bers at mid-water depths, such as the magnificent red sancord or jacopever 

 (Helicolenus maculatus), which is common all round South Africa. We 

 caught 39 specimens in a single trawl off Durban at about 500 metres. 

 Actually this handsome fish, a near relative of the northern redfish 

 (Helicolenus dactylopterus), is only partly a deep-sea fish, as it is met 

 with well in over the continental shelf. Whereas the mail-cheeked fishes 

 (Cataphracti) are richly represented in the Tropics by scorpion-fishes 

 and others, especially over the continental shelf, the commonest northern 

 European family of this order, the bullheads (Cottidce), had never been 

 known to occur in the southern hemisphere. It will be imagined what a 

 sensation there was on board when on January 20, 1952, in a haul by 

 the otter trawl at 600 metres in the Tasman Sea, we found four small 

 bullheads, the largest of them being about six centimetres long. This find 

 may prove to be one of the most sensational of the whole expedition. This 

 newly discovered fish has been described by the American ichthyologist 

 Rolf Bolin, who was with the expedition at the time, under the name 



