74 transactions liveepool biological society. 



Shrimp and Shank. 



Some Shrimps (154) have been examined, and their food 

 consisted of small Cardium edule, various algse, amphipods, 

 vegetable tissue, Copepoda, Tellina balthica, annelid 

 remains (setae and occasionally half digested portions of a 

 Nereis or a worm closely allied to it being found), Crangon 

 vulgaris (the shrimp itself), starfishes and echini (the pedi- 

 cellarise and spines), Pectinaria belgica a tubicolous annelid 

 very common in the sand below low water mark, Nauplius 

 larvae, Diatoms of various species, Eunice, small fish, and 

 a few Ostracods. 



The Shank {Pandalus annulicomis) of which 85 were 

 examined, feeds to a large extent on Sabellaria alveolata — 

 a worm which builds up masses of rock by cementing 

 together sand grains — as the stomach contains usually 

 numerous setae, occasionally the remains of the worm 

 itself, amphipods, young Mytilus edulis, vegetable matter, 

 spines of echini, stalks of Campanularians, and remains of 

 Crustacea which were unidentifiable being merely small 

 portions of legs and other appendages. 



The Maturity of Fishes. 

 It is desirable that the average size at which each species 

 of food fish arrives at maturity, or produces spawn for the 

 first time, should be determined for various parts of our 

 coast. It does not do in this matter to take the figures 

 ascertained for other places, such as the south coast or the 

 North Sea, for what little we do know of spawning sizes 

 tends to show that on different coasts the same kind of 

 fish arrives at maturity at different sizes, if not ages. 

 Consequently during last spawning season we made a 

 beginning in the examination of fish and the collection of 

 statistics in regard to size at maturity. Besides small 

 numbers of half-a-dozen other edible fish, the following 



