THE VALIDITY OF GALAXIAS KAYI RAMSAY AND OGILBY 
By G. STOKELL, CANTERBURY, NEW ZEALAND 
Summary 
In 1886 Ramsay and Ogilby described a species of Galaxias from Fifth Creek, South 
Australia, under the name of kayi, but when Regan revised the Galaxtidae in 1905 he 
identified this fish with olidus which Gunther (1866, p. 209) based on a single 
specimen, the locality being given as ? Queensland. Several points of disagreement 
between the descriptions of G. olidus and G. kayi seemed to lay this identification 
open to question, and certain circumstances noted in the course of an investigation of 
the New Zealand Galaxias suggested the possibility of G. olidus being a New Zealand 
species. In order to clarify the position the writer applied to Dr. Ethelwynn Trewavas 
of the British Museum who very kindly made an X-ray examination of the type for 
the purpose of determining the number of vertebrae. 
