the open sea and between different depth zones 

 on the continental shelf. In the shallow sounds 

 ai'ound licaufort. the Ijottoni \aries from mud 

 to sand, there is little wave action and the 

 estuarine waters are more productive than those 

 of the open sea. The i)olychaete faun;i of the 

 sounds includes many subtropical species which 

 occur at much tleei)er knels on the continental 

 shelf; more than half of them are I'estricted 

 to 10 m ov more but here the sjjecimens are 

 much smaller. It was at first thought that the 

 small s])t'cimens on the continental shelf were 

 juveniles but when ovigerous females of the 

 same size were found, it was realized that the 

 ])olychaete fauna of the continental shelf is 

 stunted. Whether this ajiiilies to other groups 

 beside the Polychaeta is uncertain but one 

 gains the im])ression that the water owrlying 

 the continental shelf is not very producti\e. 



The distribution at different depths was ob- 

 tained by an analysis of the records along the 

 Beaufort Shelf Transect. The 10 stations of 

 the transect were all sited on sand or sandy 

 mud at increasing dejith intervals and I'un in a 

 straight line from the shore at Lookout Light- 

 house to the continental slope some 40 miles 

 out to sea. The environmental conditions at each 

 station are given in Table 1 anil may be used 

 to supplement the de])th I'ange of the various 

 species marked with an asterisk in the .systema- 

 tic section. 



Polychaete worms represented 40'f of the 

 whole benthic fauna. While a few species, such as 

 S'l plitjin jiictd were found at most of the stations, 

 the majority of the species are groupetl in well- 

 marked zones at different depth intei-vals. Depth 

 itself is not thought to be the limiting factor but 

 rather the changes in other factors which are 

 correlated with dei)th. There is a well defined 

 but poor fauna on the o))en sandy shore; Scolc- 

 Icpi^ stjiKi 1)1(1 t(i is the dominant polychaete and 

 does not occur elsewhere either on the shel- 

 tered sand banks in the sounds or at deej^er 

 levels in the open sea. The fauna of the Turbu- 

 lent Zone between 3 and 20 m included several 

 very common polychaetes such as PalcaiKitiis 

 hctci'osi t(t . (hiiiindkU's carolhiai', Miif/clniKi 

 papillic<i)-iiis. and Mdci'oclyiHciic zoiialis. The 

 fauna of the Outer Shelf between 40 and 120 m 

 included another group of common species, 

 the most abundant being On ii phis uebidoxa and 

 Oirctiid fiisifontth. On the Upper SIoj)e between 



120 and 200 m the commonest polychaetes were 

 Iji ni/)ri iicris crn :i')isis, Scolaplax Cdpciisis, 

 ('li(i(t(i.:iiiii s(l(is(i. and Xiit(ini(islti.-< luto'icc us. 



Many scientists have heljied me during the 

 course of this research. A])art from those that 

 I have mentioned eai'liei-, I would like to thank 

 Dr. C. G. Bookhout. the Director of the Duke 

 University Marine Laboratoi'y during 1965. my 

 assistant Mrs. Mary Potts Montgomery, and 

 many other fi'iends in the laboratory. My jiar- 

 ticular thanks are due to Dr. Marian Pettibone 

 for ad\'ice during the writing of this rejjort and 

 for the loan of many re])rints and specimens 

 from the U.S. National Museum. 



Dr. Nancy Foster gave me helpful advice in 

 advance of her ])ublications on the Spionidae 

 and Dr. Olga Hartman sent me many specimens 

 foi- comparison. Further specimens were sent 

 by Dr. David George of the British Museum and 



Talile 1. — Till' unvii'onnu-iital i-undition.-i at each station 

 alcinu tlu' Meaufoit Slu-lf Transect. 



' The sMiiliols used lor the Milistiatc tvpcs arc: co = 

 cn.iisr, I = line, III = iiH'diiiin, S = siincl, .\I = niucl. 

 Kiirthci tict.iils will lie IiiiiikI in Uay, Field, and Mont- 



t;onicr\ (1971). 



Dr. Helmet Zibrowius of Marseilles. To all these 

 workers I tender my thanks. The collections 

 were made during the tenure of a senior foreign 

 .scientist's fellowship and I gratefully acknow- 

 ledge funds from grants 81-6264 and 81-6820 

 from the National Science P^mndation. 



Apart from certain reference specimens which 

 were sent to the Duke University Marine Labora- 

 tory, the whole collection has been donated to 

 the U.S. National Mu.seum. 



