Zoology.-] NATURAL HISTORY OF VICTORIA. [Fishes. 



some fancied resemblance to a Cod, to which it has no affinity and 

 little likeness. It is by far the largest of all our fresh- water fish, 

 and is in request for the table all the year round. It sometimes 

 reaches lOOlbs. in weight, and examples of 401bs. are common. It 

 feeds voraciously on fish and Crustacea ; twenty full-grown speci- 

 mens of the smaller Murray Crayfish (Astacopsis bicarinatus) were 

 taken from the stomach of the specimen figured in our Plate 85, 

 which measured three feet four and a half inches in length. The 

 color varies considerably, the very large specimens being greyish 

 with a slight, dull, greenish tinge above, but whitish on the belly; 

 the dusky spots being very small and excessively numerous ; while 

 in the smaller specimens the spots are always much larger, and 

 frequently clustered in angular patches, as in our Plate 86 ; these 

 smaller specimens are more decidedly yellowish -olive in the ground 

 color. 



There is a very common opinion among the fish dealers and 

 other observers that there are two distinct species confounded 

 under the name of Murray Cod, the one with a narrow snout, 

 and the other with a broadly -rounded blunt one, and it is easy 

 to separate the two forms when a heap of the fish is sorted. 

 I am convinced, however, that the difference is sexual, and 

 that the two forms agree precisely in all the other proportions, 

 the number of fin-rays, and in the number of scales along the 

 lateral line and above and below it, as well as in coloring. 

 The depth of the body I find also varies from 3^ in the large 

 to about j in the small examples in the total length. The length 

 of the orbit in the moderately large specimen (No. 1 of table of 

 measurements given below) is contained about 9 times in the 

 length of the head ; in the next (No. 2) 8 times ; in the next 

 (No. 3) 7^ ; in the next (No. 4) 7 times ; in the smallest (No. 5) 

 about 5 times ; and in the largest (No. 6) it is contained about 

 10^ times ; bearing out the remark I have made, in relation 

 to other fish, that the proportionate size of the eye is always 

 larger in young or small individuals, and is gradually a less 

 fraction of the length of the head or body in the older or larger 

 individuals. 



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