REVIEW OF LOCAL FISHES 35 



The Basking Shark is a northern fish, very rarely straggling south- 

 ward as far as New York, and although it has occurred in our waters, 

 it may not do so again for many years. It is as large as any known fish, 

 reaching a length of over thirty feet. It swims sluggishly in the open 

 ocean, generally near the surface; doubtless, like the whalebone whale, 

 subsisting on small food which it strains from the water. Its teeth are 

 very small, its gill-slits very long, taking in almost the entire depth of the 

 body, and it has the keeled tail of the mackerel shark. 



The Spined Dogfish is readily told from all our other sharks by the 

 single stout spine in front of each of its back fins. It is small (three 

 feet being a large one), slender, and travels in schools sometimes of im- 

 mense size. It occurs off our coast abundantly in fall and winter. 



Though little marketeH, the Spined Dogfish is an excellent food fish, 

 if properly cooked. The fie?h should be soaked or boiled in vinegar, or 

 some acid, cooked thoroughly, and with plenty of butter or oil. This 

 species occurs in tremendous schools, especially in autumn. It has been 

 rather extensively canned as "Greyfish." 



The Rays are shark-like fishes with peculiarly flattened bodies 

 adapted to life on the bottom. The breast fins are expanded and con- 

 fluent with the body, the body and breast fins forming what is called 

 the disk. Some of the most remarkable existing fishes are intermediate 

 between the shark and the ray type. One of these, the Monkfish, is 

 an uncommon summer visitor to our coast. It may be at once .recognized 

 by its circular head, constricted neck and wing-like breast fins. The 

 Skates are more or less spiny rays with rhomboidal disks and slender 

 spiny tails. Their two dorsal fins are placed close together, far back on 

 the tail. We have four species of skates. Our commonest species is a 

 small one, the Common Skate, reaching a length of one or two feet. The 

 snout end of its disk is broadly rounded, the small teeth are in about 

 fifty series, whereas those of the Big Skate, which resembles it in shape, 

 are in about ninety. This latter fish usually has a large ocellated spot on 

 either side of the upper surface. It reaches a length of three feet. The 

 small Clear-nosed Skate, which occurs in summer, has a pointed snout 

 with translucent area on either side of it, and the large Barn Door Skate, 

 which reaches a length of four feet, has the head and snout long, produced, 

 ending in a blunt tipped angle. The egg-cases of skates are familiar 

 objects washed up along the seashore, leathery, rectangular, with 

 lengthwise prongs at the four corners, usually blackish. The skates 

 are first-rate food fish, though not eaten by our native population, who 

 do not like their looks. 



