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BULLETIN OF THE BUREAU OF FISHEEIES 
Family XXI. — D0R0S0M1D/E. The gizzard shads 
Body rather short and deep, strongly compressed; head small, short; mouth small, inferior; 
gill rakers numerous, slender; no lateral line; scales thin, cycloid, deciduous; anal fin long and low; 
the stomach rounded and very muscular, developed into a “gizzard.” Mud-eating fishes. 
29. Genus DOROSOMA Rafinesque 
This genus is readily recognized by the prolongation of the last ray of the dorsal fin. A single 
species is recognized from the United States. 
39. Dorosoma cepediamim (LeSueur). Gizzard shad; “Toothed herring”; “Oldwife”; “Mud 
shad.” 
Megalops cepedina LoSueur, Journ., Ac. Nat. Sci., Phila., vol. 1, 1818, p. 301; Delaware and Chesapeake Bays. 
Dorosoma cepedianum Uhler and Lugger, 1876, ed. I, p. 160; ed. II, p. 136; Bean, 1883, p. 367; Jordan and Evermann, 1896-1900, 
p. 416, PI. LXIX, fig. 183. 
Head 3.3 to 4.6; depth 2.25 to 2.8; dorsal 14 or 15; anal 30 to 34; scales 56 to 64; ventral scutes 
29 to 31. Body rather deep (with depth quite variable), compressed, the abdomen compressed, 
with sharp scutes on ventral edge; head rather small (variable); snout blunt, projecting beyond 
mouth, 4.5 to 5.1 in head; eye with adipose eyelids, 3.45 to 5.25; interorbital 3.3 to 4.3; mouth infer- 
ior, rather small; maxillary reaching about opposite anterior margin of pupil, 3.1 to 3.75 in head; 
teeth wanting in the adult; gill rakers long and slender, numerous, about 135 on lower limb of first 
arch; scales rather large, reduced scales extending on base of caudal fin; lateral line wanting; dorsal 
fin rather small, somewhat elevated anteriorly, the last ray produced, sometimes nearly as long as 
head, origin of the fin somewhat nearer tip of snout than base of caudal; caudal fin rather deeply 
forked; anal fin very long, longer than head, 2.35 to 3.6 in length of body, its origin well behind the 
end of base of dorsal; ventral fins small, inserted about equidistant from base of pectorals and origin 
of anal, 1.65 to 2.3 in head; pectoral fins larger than ventrals, 1.15 to 1.3 in head. 
Color of adult plain metalic blue above, silvery on sides; fins all more or less dusky. The color 
of immature fish, 107 to 127 millimeters in length, sea-green above, silvery below, frequently with a 
small black spot at shoulder; fins plain, dorsal and anal sometimes slightly dusky. 
The Chesapeake collection contains 31 specimens ranging from 3 % to 13 inches in length. 
No very young individuals were seen in brackish water. “The young are extremely different from 
the adult, slender and minnowlike in shape, and with a row of fine teeth on upper jaw, although 
the mouth of the adult is entirely toothless and smooth. The internal structure of the young also 
differs remarkably from that of the full-grown fish, especially in the much greater simplicity of the 
digestive apparatus, the intestine in specimens not more than an inch long passing almost directly 
back from the stomach to the vent.” (Forbes and Richardson, 1908, p. 47.) The young also 
differ from the adult in having a large dark spot on the shoulder. 
