12 BULLETIN 2, U. S. DEPARTMENT OE AGRICULTURE. 
An examination of bottom mud has shown it to containlarge quantities 
of living and dead microorganisms, making up more than half of its 
bulk. This is supposed to constitute the food of the bivalves and 
other aquatic animals of similar habits. It has been shown by Peck 1 
that the menhaden is provided with a mechanism, situated upon the 
anterior edge of the gill arches, and known as " gill rakers." by means 
of which it is able to strain out from the water in which it swims the 
microorganisms which live there. " These minute organisms furnish 
directly the food of the menhaden. * * * The whole food supply 
of this fish is obtained by filtering out from the surface stratum of 
water the organic life there -uspended." 2 
SPAWNING. 
Very little is known definitely of the breeding habits of the men- 
haden. Xumerous theories are entertained by the fishermen. Some 
confess ignorance: others believe they spawn in southern rivers; 
others, that they spawn " on the edge of the Gulf stream." 
The large number of young which appear on the coast of Xorth 
Carolina in early spring indicate the nearness of the spawning ground 
to that region and of the spawning season to that time. The absence 
of a developed roe in the fish of that region in the summer and its 
appearance only in late fall and winter mark the time of spawning 
there as the winter or early spring. As the fish have disappeared 
from the coast at that time, except along the Carolinas and Florida. 
the spawning ground must be on the shores of either the Carolinas 
or Florida. Evidence is lacking that they enter the rivers at this 
time in sufficient numbers to represent a concerted movement toward 
a spawning ground, such as is shown by other fish, occurring in 
much smaller numbers than the menhaden, in the spawning season. 
Hathaway 3 states that he has examined many hundreds of men- 
haden caught between Cape Lookout. X. C. and Georgetown. S. C. 
from the 20th of Xovember to the 10th of December, among which 
there was not one that did not show a roe development such as to 
indicate that it would spawn within 30 to 60 days. 
Smith has shown that menhaden have been taken on the coast of 
Xorth Carolina in Xovember from which spawn was running show- 
ing conclusively that menhaden may spawn in Xovember. 4 and states 
that in spring and early summer the menhaden spawns in abundance 
on the northern part of the middle Atlantic and the southern part 
of the Xew England coast, and in late autumn and early winter on 
the southern part of the middle Atlantic and the northern part of the 
south Atlantic coa>t. 
**' On the Food of the Menhaden,' - Bull. U. S. Fish Commission, 1S93, p. 113. 
2 Peck. loc. cit. cf. p. 114. 
3 " The Menhaden Industry,'' American Fertilizer. 3S, 44 (1913). 
* Smith, Hugh M.. Fishes of North Carolina. N. C. Geol. and Econ. Survey, p. 132. 
6 Hathaway, Bull. Bureau of Fisheries, 1908, PL I, cf. pp. 277-278. 
