426 REPORT OF NEW JERSEY STATE MUSEUM. 



colored like back. Ventrals dirty white. Length about 41 inches. 

 Delaware Bay. 



This large fish is abundant on our coast and is known by a 

 variety of common names. It is noted for its g'reat voracity and 

 exceptional ugliness of appearance. I have records of its capture 

 at Cape May, Stone Harbor, Sea Isle City, Atlantic City and 

 Asbury Park. It also occurs in deep water, but is usually seen 

 in our hmits about the shallows, where it is frequently taken by 

 fishermen. It is not used as food and is usually the object of 

 disgust. 



Lophius americanus Valenciennes, Hist. Nat. Poiss., XII, 1837, 

 p. 283. 



Sophius americanMs Abbott, Geol. N. J., 1868, p. 818, evi- 

 dently misprint for Lophius. 



Family ANTENNARIIDiE. 



The Frog Fishes. 



Head and body more or less compressed. Mouth very oblique, 

 opening upward. Lower jaw projecting. Premaxillary protrac- 

 tile. Jaws with cardiform teeth. Gill-openings small, pore-like, 

 in or behind lower axils of pectorals. Gills 2^ or 3. No pseudo- 

 branchiae. No pyloric coeca. Skin naked, smooth or prickly. 

 Pectoral members forming an elbow-like angle. Pseudobrachia 

 long, with 3 actinosts. Spinous dorsal of I to III serrated ten- 

 tacle-like spines. Rayed dorsal long, larger than anal. Ventrals 

 present, jugular, near together. 



Fishes of tropical seas, pelagic, often living in or among float- 

 ing sea-weed. By filling their capacious stomachs with air they 

 are enabled to sustain themselves on the surface of the water. 

 Two species straying to our shores. 



Genus Pterophrynk Gill. 

 The Mouse Fishes. 

 Key to the species. 



a. Bait on first dorsal bifurcate at tip. histrio 



aa. Bait on first dorsal bulbous, covered with fleshy filaments. gibba 



