50 THE TARPON 



Upon receipt of this letter, I procured an adult tarpon, 

 weighing about ninety pounds and had it shipped to Dr. Hilde- 

 brand. I quote from his report on this specimen: 



"Referring to my letter of August 21, I have now ex- 

 amined the air bladder of the large tarpon more closely. 

 I find the structures essentially as in the small specimens 

 reported upon sometime ago. There is, however, this slight 

 difference: In the large fish the two main bands of lung- 

 tissue are entirely separate, whereas in the young they 

 are attached to each other, except for a short distance 

 posteriorly. In addition to the two main strands there are 

 two small weU separated ones. 



"Two large blood vessels in the wall of the air bladder 

 parallel the two principal bands of lung tissue. 



"The short tube forming the connection with the oeso- 

 phagus has very heavy walls about Vs" thick in the large 

 fish. 



"I would judge that the large specimen, in proportion 

 to its size, has equally as large an amount of lung tissue 

 as the small ones. 



' ' The stomach of the large fish contained the remains of 

 six marine catfish, all of about uniform size. I would judge 

 from the remains that the fish were about eight to ten 

 inches long. Identification is uncertain, but they most 

 probably were Gaelichthys milherti. 



The following measurements and counts were taken: 



Total length 177.5 cm. Width 9.0 cm. 



Standard length . . .148.7 " Girth 80.0 " 



Head 38.7 " D, 15 (including 2 rudiments) 



Depth 31.2 " A. about 25 (Rays very diffi- 



Scales 5-461 (Series of scales cult to count because of 



between lateral line and the heavy tissues on the 



anal too irregular to count ) . rays ) . 



