attention. Our research on the fishes of Newport 

 River in this paper, although not providing the 

 tvpe of quantitative information needed for 

 mathematical modeling, is serving as a guide for 

 ongoing quantitative studies on the biomass and 

 numerical abundance of these fish populations. 



DESCRIPTION OF STUDY AREA 



Newport River originates on the coastal 

 plains of North Carolina in a swampy area near 

 a group of natural lakes in the Croatan National 

 Forest. The northwest prong (6.08 km long) 

 and the southwest prong (14.02 km long) are 

 the two main tributaries which converge to form 

 the river proper. From the confluence of these 

 two prongs, the river courses eastward for 

 18.57 km then broadens into the Newport estu- 

 ary (Fig. 1). The estuary continues eastward 



then dips south to join the Atlantic Ocean at 

 Beaufort Inlet. From the mouth of the river 

 to its juncture with the ocean, the linear distance 

 along the main channel of the estuary is 19.18 km. 

 The surface area of the estuary has been esti- 

 mated at 31 km^ (Cross, Duke, and Willis, 1970) ; 

 whereas the surface area of the river proper, 

 from the junction of the two prongs to the mouth, 

 is only 0.48 km-. 



The upper section of the river drains hard- 

 wood swamps and pine forests which yield down- 

 stream to marshlands. The banks are low but 

 steep, and grade sharply into the channel with 

 very little or no littoral area. Channel depths 

 range from 0.6 m, where the river shoals near 

 the mouth, to 4.6 m in the deepest upstream pock- 

 et. Mean channel depth was estimated from a 

 series of soundings to be 3.0 m at low tide. 



Newport River estuary is generally less than 

 1.0 m deep at mean low tide, and the shallow 



KMomatar* 



Figure 1. — Zones designated for sampling fishes in Newport River, N.C., during 1970. 



