BARENTS SEA IN AUGUST, 1907. 97 



these cumbersome creatures. Steam power was necessary to remove 

 them from the remainder of the trawl contents, so that this and 

 hoisting over the ship's side was made one operation. Before cutting 

 the monsters adrift a lateral incision was made through which the 

 liver was extracted. 



To have opened the stomach as the fish lay upon the heap would 

 not have improved the remainder of the catch. In two instances, 

 however, I was able to examine the stomach contents. 



In the first instance the food consisted of three codlings, about 

 40 cm., and a plaice of the same length. On the second occasion I 

 found in a fish 6 ft. 10 ins. (208 cm.) in length two round fish (one 

 probably a codling, about 60 cm. in length), one long rough dab, and 

 a piece some twelve inches long from the mid-lateral region of one 

 of the salmon species {Salmo salar ?) evidently a large fish. 



Quantities of plaice could be observed at times pouring from the 

 mouth of these sharks when suspended by the tail and lowered over 

 the ship's side. That their depredations amongst the plaice are great, I 

 feel convinced. I do not think the missing and damaged tails, so frequent 

 as to be commonly noted by the fishermen, can be otherwise accounted for. 



I have observed in the North Sea that when the dogfish (Acanthias 

 vulgaris) feeds on small plaice, these are devoured from the tail first, 

 in contrast to round fishes, such as herring, which are taken head first. 



In my samples, the significant number of 113 fish, or nearly 2| per 

 cent of the total, I found with tails more or less damaged, and subse- 

 quently healed; in some instances the whole tail had disappeared. 

 The possibility of this phenomenon being the result of disease, such 

 as is sometimes found to be destroying the tails and fins of fresh- water 

 fish, would seem excluded, as the damaged extremities were clean and 

 healthy. In the only exception the extremities of the tail rays were 

 raw and bleeding. 



All these facts, in conjunction with the concave shape of the 

 majority of the assumed bites, seemed to me to point to the successful 

 escape of the individual plaice from the jaws of a Greenland shark, 

 though, as previously suggested, the possibility of depredations by 

 seals must not be overlooked. 



Starry Ray {Raia radiata). 



This was the only ray species which occurred, and only occasional, 

 full grown specimens were to be seen. Two female fish in one haul 

 measured 35 and 37 cm. between the extremities of the pectoral fins. 

 In the stomach of each of these was found two large specimens of 

 the Arctic shrimp (Sclerocrangon horeas), identified by Mr. K. A. Todd, 



