6 U.S. NATIONAL MUSEUM BULLETIN 2 58 



the years 1961-63, primarily for the purpose of detecting extremely 

 rare species. These samples are called "formalin washes" and consist 

 of the washing of large quantities of substrate, flora, or sessile animals 

 in a bucket of weak formaldehyde and seawater. The weak preserva- 

 tive disturbs motile organisms which emerge from their nestling 

 sites, swim briefly in the water, die, and fall to the bottom of the 

 bucket. The residues in the bucket are screened and preserved. 

 Analyses of a few of these washes are included in Appendix I, es- 

 pecially those in which records of rare species are noted. Presumably 

 a few species of Amphipoda are insufficiently mobile to be collected 

 in formalin washes, although aliquots of washed substrates were 

 examined in the laboratory for species which might not have emerged. 

 Only Polycheria antarctica, an inhabitant of tunicates, was found 

 still embedded in the tests of the hosts. 



In the laboratory the samples were washed in a Tyler Screen of 

 0.5 mm. mesh, the Amphipoda counted and identified and in some 

 cases separated by species into lots. However, after processing, most 

 of the samples were represerved in alcohol in bulk lots and deposited 

 in the collections of the Allan Hancock Foundation, University of 

 Southern California, Los Angeles. Aliquots of the larger mass-samples 

 were taken by weighing on a microgram balance. 



Several species of rare occurrence and juveniles of others have not 

 been described or identified. These are reserved until the survey 

 can be extended to the north and south and into subintertidal depths 

 where presumably larger suites of adults may be collected. 



Ecological records of Amphipoda cited in the systematic section 

 to follow are frequently appended with the terms rare, scarce, moder- 

 ately abundant, and abundant. These approximations refer to the 

 frequency of the species only in relation to other species of the stated 

 sample. 



The Collecting Localities 



Northern area. — A single collecting locality on the Monterey 

 Peninsula at Carmel Point represents the northern limit of this 

 survey. It lies on the coast of middle California in the Montereyan 

 subprovince of the Oregonian zoogeographic province. Its fauna is 

 believed to be a southern representative of the cold-temperate region. 

 The writer, after analysis of the samples, concluded that the selected 

 site does not represent the richest possible habitat for Amphipoda 

 in the area. Further exploration of the Monterey Peninsula has not 

 been possible because of the termination of the writer's tenure in 

 California. Floristically, the locality probably was impoverished and 

 poorly protected from surf because the amphipodan fauna of rock- 



