frequently utilized (Maksimov 1972). Northeast of 

 Brazil, however, Maksimov found that shallower dwell- 

 ing carangids and mackerels were frequently consumed, 

 along with Alepisaurus. 



Alepisaurus spp. — In the western North Atlantic, 

 Haedrich (1964) reported findings similar to ours: 

 paralipidids, sternoptychids, and alepisaurids were the 

 most frequently occurring fishes. The midwater myc- 

 tophids, gonostomatids, stomiatids, and chauliodontids 

 that we observed, however, either occurred infrequently 

 or were completely absent. 



The most important food organisms in Alepisaurus 

 from the Indian Ocean (Parin et al. 1969) were fishes of 

 the families Sternoptychidae (Sternoptyx diaphana), 

 Bramidae, Alepisauridae, Nomeidae, Paralepididae, and 

 Gempylidae. Myctophidae, Gonostomatidae, and other 

 fishes that make daily vertical migrations were missing. 

 They suggsted that Alepisaurus feeds in the depths 

 between the daytime and nighttime accumulation levels 

 of migrating fishes, and passage of these interzonal pop- 

 ulations may be quite rapid through the depths where 

 the Alepisaurus were located, explaining the paucity of 

 vertically migrating organisms. 



In the southeastern Pacific, epipelagic fishes were 

 more frequently eaten by Alepisaurus than midwater 

 forms (Haedrich and Nielsen 1966), although some 

 deeper living fishes such as Dolichopteryx were also oc- 

 casionally present. Alepisaurus stomachs from Suruga 

 Bay, Japan, contained fishes from surface, midwater, 

 and bottom zones (Kubota and Uyeno 1969; Kubota 

 1973). The four dominant fishes in both studies were 

 Gephroberyx japonicus, Lophius litulon, Trichiurus lep- 

 turus, and Engraulis japonica. In Alepisaurus from New 

 Caledonia (Grandperrin and Legand 1970), the most 

 frequently consumed fishes were Diplospinus mul- 

 tistriatus (30%) and Sternoptyx diaphana (24%). 

 Cephalopods were present in 15% of the stomachs, 

 crustaceans in 10%, and annelids in 12%, most often in 

 young Alepisaurus specimens. 



Most studies on tuna food have been limited either to 

 qualitative analysis or to quantitative analysis based on 

 a relatively small number of stomach samples from a 

 limited area. The accumulation of such data has made 

 evident the currently acknowledged opportunistic 

 feeding pattern in tunas. A better understanding of inter- 

 specific differences in forage utilization might be met 

 through large-scale quantitative analyses of tuna forage 

 in comparison with in situ fauna and oceanographic con- 

 ditions; there seems little need, however, for additional 

 qualitative studies of tuna food in the future. 



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 



We thank James L. Squire and Peter C. Wilson for per- 

 mitting Gibbs and Collette to participate in longline 

 cruises on the Delaware to collect tunas and stomach 

 contents. Eugene L. Nakamura advised us on ways of 

 analyzing the stomach contents. Ray S. Birdsong sorted 

 some of the first fishes out of the stomach contents. 



Daniel M. Cohen, George C. Miller, William D. Ander- 

 son, Robert H. Gibbs, Jr., Arthur W. Kendall, Jr., David 

 G. Smith, James C. Tyler, Theodore W. Pietsch, and 

 others identified fishes. Thomas E. Bowman and Clyde 

 Roper assisted in the identification of amphipods and 

 cephalopods respectively. Keiko Hiratsuka Moore as- 

 sisted with the figures and Terry L. Sayers typed the 

 manuscript and tables. Alexander Dragovich offered use- 

 ful suggestions during the preparation of this paper. 

 Drafts of the manuscript were read by Daniel M. Cohen, 

 Robert H. Gibbs, Jr., C. C. Lu, Eugene L. Nakamura, 

 Thomas C. Potthoff, and Austin B. Williams. 



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