526 Mr. F. Day on the British Weevers, 



LI. — On the British Weevers^ the Bih, and the Poor- Cod. 

 By Feancis Day, C.I.E., F.L.S., &c. 



In last month's number of the ' Annals and Magazine of 

 Natural History/ Prof. M'Intosh, Superintendent of the 

 Marine Laboratory at St. Andrews, propounded the two 

 following opinions : that it is possible the lesser and greater 

 weevers {Trachinus vipera and T. draco) are only the young 

 and adult stages of one species ; also that the Gadus minutus 

 is the young of the bib or G. luscus. As in that paper 

 some of my views are discussed, I have thought that a short 

 reply to the article may be desirable. 



I do not propose entering into the history of these two 

 forms, of which the greater weever, Trachinus draco^ up to 

 the time of Gmelin's ' Linneeus ' (ed. 12), was considered a 

 species, and the lesser weever was deemed the same fish or 

 merely a variety, but which latter figured in Willughby, 

 1686, and Ray, 1713, as a distinct species, while Duhamel, 

 in France, clearly laid down the reasons why it ought to be 

 so looked upon. Since then every British and French author 

 who has studied ichthyology has recorded both as species. 

 Specimens of each have been found containing eggs ; Couch 

 was so fortunate as to possess a young one of the larger form 

 only three quarters of an inch in length ; while there are cer- 

 tain structural differences between T. draco and T. vipera ; 

 and I would suggest whether it is not possible that the better 

 plan would have been to obtain the intermediate forms before 

 giving publicity to the theory that one was the young of the 

 other, and that without proof. 



If we turn to the works of Cuvier and Valenciennes, Yar- 

 rell, Couch, Giinther, Moreau, and my own, we find the fin- 

 rays thus recorded : — Trachinus draco ^ or the greater weever : 

 dorsal from 29 to 31 rays, anal from 30 to 34 rays ; T. vipera^ 

 or the lesser weever: dorsal from 21 to 24 rays, anal from 

 24 to 26 rays. No intermediate numbers, so far as I am 

 aware, have been enumerated from British specimens ; and 

 without such gradations (not the result of hybridization), or 

 without showing sexual differences, I think it is unsafe to 

 conclude that the larger form is merely the adult of the smaller 

 species. 



The difference in the absence of spines above the orbit in 

 the smaller form and its greater depth in proportion to its 

 length " are given as distinctions which it is possible dis- 

 appear with age." As the supraorbital spines are absent from 

 the smaller specimen, but seen in the larger, it is somewhat 

 unlikely, not impossible, that they first appear in the older 

 fish ; but the reverse is the general rule, spines about the head 

 in the young Acanthopterygians becoming blunt or even 



