along the eastern coast of Brazil from Pernambuco 

 to Sao Paulo in southern spring and summer (Sep- 

 tember to March). No doubt it is the Japanese data 

 on which Mather (1971) bases his remarks about 

 Brazilian and mid-ocean concentrations. Japanese 

 fishing effort is far from consistent (Ueyanagi et al. 

 1970, fig. 17) and the hook rate data are difficult to 

 evaluate. The tendency to set many hooks in good 

 fishing areas obscures the density by lowering the 

 hook rate index. Similarly the grouping of data on 

 maturity by quarters obscures the early summer 

 spawning peak since it is divided between two quar- 

 ters. Actually it is unclear how widespread is the 

 early summer spawning peak. In the western Atlan- 

 tic, data based on gonad examination and appear- 

 ance of larvae (de Sylva, pers. comm.) indicate that 

 spawning is largely complete by May at which time 

 migration is already under way. 



Mather et al. (1972) review the Japanese data in 

 greater detail and summarize information gained 

 from the Cooperative Game Fish Tagging Program 

 in the western Atlantic. They note that one North 

 Atlantic population concentrates along the middle 

 Atlantic coast of the United States in the summer 

 and moves to the north coast of South America in 

 winter. They also record the separate summer con- 

 centration in the Northern Gulf of Mexico but be- 

 cause it shares a northern South American winter- 

 ing ground the relationships of the two was said to 

 be uncertain. So too was the origin of the popula- 

 tion that occurs in summer off Venezuela. The 

 white marlin in the South Atlantic was clearly rec- 

 ognized by these authors as separate from those in 

 the north. No information was given for the north- 

 eastern Atlantic. 



The migratory path of the white marlin to and 

 from the approaches to Gibraltar is unknown but 

 data published by Ueyanagi et al. (1970 appendix, 

 figs. 2 j, k, 1) suggest progressive movement south 



along Africa to about lat. 5° N. 



Clearly an intensive program of research is 

 needed on this important food and game species. 



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 



Many persons have aided the billfish research 

 program at the School of Marine and Atmospheric 

 Science. Those previously acknowledged by Rob- 

 ins and de Sylva (1961: 384-384) and Rodriguez- 

 Roda and Howard (1963) are omitted here. The late 

 John K. Howard made all the arrangements for the 

 Mediterranean work and subsidized much of its 

 cost. The writer's travel to Europe and the pur- 

 chase of some of the material was supported by the 

 Maytag Chair of Ichthyology. Analysis of the data 

 and preparation of the paper is part of a program on 

 oceanic fishes supported by the National Science 

 Foundation (NSF-GB-7015x, C. Richard Robins, 

 principal investigator). Shari Lou Buxton processed 

 the data for the tables. Donald P. de Sylva re- 

 viewed the manuscript and made available data on 

 the white marlin in the western Atlantic. Finally, I 

 especially thank Rui Monteiro and Julio 

 Rodriguez-Roda, Laboratorio del Instituto de In- 

 vestigaciones Pesqueras, Cadiz, Spain, for aiding 

 the writer in many ways during his work at Olhao, 

 Portugal and Cadiz, Spain. 



LITERATURE CITED 



CANESTRINI. G. 



1861. Sopra una nuova species di Tetrapturus. Arch. 

 Zool. Anat. Fisiol. l(l):259-261, pi. 17. 

 DE SYLVA, D. P.. and W. P. DAVIS. 



1963. White marlin, Tetrapturus albidus, in the Middle 

 American Bight, with observations on the hydrography of 

 the fishing grounds. Copeia 1963:81-99. 



Table 1.— Fin-ray counts of western 1 and eastern Atlantic white marlin. Tetrapturus al- 

 bidus. 



Dorsal Spines D 2 Rays Anal Spines A2 Rays P, Rays 2 



38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 5 6 7 13 14 15 16 17 18 5 6 7 17 18 19 20 21 22 



W. 



Atl - 1 3 8 10 11 9 - - 20 21 1 4 18 18 5 2 41 - 1 i 6 '1 9 - 



E. 



AtI - 1 7 16 19 8 5 1 26 30 - 2 9 28 12 3 2 5 50 1 - 2 10 30 13 1 



1 Data from Robins and de Sylva (1961: Table 1) 



2 Only the left pectoral fin was counted. 



167 



