THETARPON 29 



June 22nd, 1920. One female was spent, having very 

 few eggs left in the ovaries and these contained minute 

 specks of blood. She was bright and healthy looking, 

 having the appearance of being fresh from the sea. 

 It is not uncommon to see a tarpon which has a dis- 

 tinct yellowish color, which to my mind denotes a com- 

 paratively long sojourn either in fresh or shallow 

 water. The eggs from this fish were not perceptibly 

 larger than the others examined. In several cases eggs 

 were ejected by slight pressure along the belly of the 

 fish. I also saw a male eject milt while in the act of 

 leaping while on the hook, and heard of another case 

 where this was observed by a fellow angler. The evi- 

 dence seemed to point to the conclusion that some of 

 these fish were ready to spawn. I experimented to 

 see if the eggs would float in sea water but they in- 

 variably sank to the bottom. The small fry greedily 

 devoured them. 



I arranged with my guide, Mr. Mack Mickle of Boca 

 Grande, to examine fish after I left. He took ten or 

 fifteen samples of eggs from June 22nd to about Au- 

 gust 5th, 1920. He also found several spent females 

 and sent me samples of the eggs he took. The last 

 eggs taken show no noticeable increase in size over 

 those taken a month earlier. Mr. Nichols kindly 

 measured these eggs. They ran from 0.6 to 0.75 mm. 

 in diameter. As I am quite sure that some of these 

 specimens were taken from spent fish I am reasonably 

 certain they were fully developed. It, therefore, seems 

 to be fairly well established that the eggs of the tarpon 

 are exceedingly small and remarkably numerous. 



