242 PROCEEDjyafi or the y.ivvo.Y.iL muf^eum. vol. 39. 



I, 5, below or behind pectorals. Pectoral fins normal. Caudal fin 

 usually not forked. Ear bones or otoliths very large. Pyloric cseca 

 usually rather few. Air bladder usually large and complicated, 

 rarely wanting. Most of the species make a peculiar noise, called 

 variously croaking, grunting, drumming, and snoring; this sound is 

 caused by muscular action on the air bladder. An important family 

 of food fishes found on sandy shores in all warm seas, a few species 

 being confined to fresh waters. None occurs in deep water and none 

 among rocks. Many of them reach a large size, and nearly all are 

 valued for food. All are carnivorous and some are of interest as game 

 fishes. 



KEY TO GENERA. 



a^. Preopercle with spine-like teeth, the lowermost largest, plectroid, directed abruptly 

 downward; gill rakers comparatively long and slender, about 8 -f 12 to 30 in 

 number Bairdiella, 1 . 



a-. Preopercle entire, or with feeble serrations, without plectroid spine; gill rakers 

 comparatively short and thick, the number usually 5 to 8 + 8 to 15.. Scisena, 2. 



1. Genus BAIRDIELLA Gill. 



Bairdiella Gill, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., 1861, p. 33 {argyroleuca=chrysiira) . 

 Nector Jordan and Evermann, Fish. North and Middle America, vol. 2, 1898, 

 p. 1436 (chrysoleuca) . 



This genus is characterized by the oblique mouth, little cavernous 

 skull, few rows of small teeth, slender gill rakers and the preopercle 

 armed with a plectroid spine. It is certainly a very natural group, 

 and worthy of recognition as a distinct genus. The numerous 

 species are all American with one exception. They are all small in 

 size and silvery in coloration, and some of them are remarkable for 

 the great size of the second anal spine. In others this spine is quite 

 small. These variations among species unquestionably closely 

 allied show how slight is the systematic value to be attached to the 

 size of this spine. The single Japanese species has been recorded 

 but once. It belongs to the subgenus Nector, and it is related to 

 Bairdiella armata from Panama, and to Bairdiella verse-crucis from 

 the Caribbean Sea. 



1. BAIRDIELLA ACANTHODES (Bleeker). 



"} Bairdiella armata Gill, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., 1863, p. 164; Panama. 

 Pseudoscisena acanthodes Bleeker, Verh. Kon. Akad. Wet. Amsterdam, vol. 18, 



1879, p. 29, pi. 1; Japan, from a specimen in the Museum at Hamburg. 

 Bairdiella acanthodes Jordan and Snyder, Check List, Ann. Zool. Jap., vol. 3, 



pts. 2, 3, 1901, p. 81, name only. 



Habitat. — Southern Japan (the record perhaps open to cjuestion, 

 as the genus Bairdiella is otherwise confined to the warmer parts of 

 America and only the single specimen in the museum at Hamburg 

 is known from Japan) . 



