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Part III. — Eighth Annual Report 
SECTION B— BIOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS, 
I._ON THE FOOD OF FISHES. By W. Ramsay Smith, B.Sc. 
The following pages embody the results of a second year's observations 
on the food of fishes, carried on chiefly by Mr Thomas Scott, F.L.S., on 
board the ' Garland.' Although the observations have hot been made 
quite continuously during either year, the results already obtained give 
very decided indication of the lines along which investigations will have 
to be made, and promise to shed much light on the hitherto very obscure 
subject of the food of our commonest food fishes. The introductory 
remarks here made will be confined almost exclusively to the fish 
examined in the Forth and in St Andrews Bay, since the stations there 
furnish the best record of facts for comparison. 
To begin with, one noteworthy fact is the similarity of this year's 
results to those of last year, as regards both the Firth of Forth and St 
Andrews Bay, wherever the numbers of fish examined have been sufficient 
to justify the expectation that the percentages recorded are trustworthy 
indications of the extent to which fishes feed on any particular genus or 
species of animals. Another fact is that the same kinds of fish feed most 
abundantly on similar food, say echinoderms, annelids, crustaceans, 
molluscs, fish, both in the Firth of Forth and in St Andrews Bay, although 
there may be variations in the relative numbers of the genera, and in 
the particular species, forming the bulk of their food ; these variations 
being due to the differences in the faunas of the two localities, or to other 
causes at present unknown. A few notes on the food of some of the 
important fishes, based on the residts of the two years' investigations of 
the Firth of Forth and St Andrews Bay, may be given. 
Plaice. — The chief food of these consists of annelids, Sabella, Priapulus, 
Nereis, and Sipunculus being the commonest forms in the Firth of Forth 
in both years ; and Terebella, Phyllodoce, and Nereis in St Andrews Bay. 
The large number of unidentified annelids found must, however, be borne 
in mind in this connection. Next in order, but to a slightly less extent, 
come molluscs, the most common forms being Scrobicularia, Venus, Solen, 
and Mactra in the Firth of Forth ; and, in addition to these, Nucula in 
St Andrews Bay. Arthropods are much less important as food, especially 
in the Firth of Forth ; but in St Andrews Bay Ampelisca and Portunus 
are fairly common. Fish forms almost no part of the food of plaice, 
except at Station VI. in the Firth of Forth, where sand-eels were largely 
eaten by plaice in 1888. Echinoderms seem to be of little importance as 
food to plaice. 
Lemon Soles. — In the Firth of Forth these feed most largely on anne- 
lids, as do plaice, and on the same forms ; but the place of molluscs is 
taken by arthropods, as next in importance in the diet of the lemon sole, 
molluscs, echinoderms, and fish being comparatively unimportant. In St 
Andrews Bay only a few lemon soles were examined, and they all con- 
tained annelids in both years. 
Common Dabs. — The diet of these is more varied than that of the two 
forms already mentioned. In the Firth of Forth arthropods (consisting 
chiefly of hermit crabs), and in St Andrews Bay annelids (Terebella, 
