FOURTEEN TELEOSTEAN FISHES AT BEAUFORT, N. C. 
457 
Specimens 1+5 millimeters long . — The difference between specimens of this size 
and 30-millimeter ones is not pronounced. The body remains proportionately 
deeper and much more strongly compressed than in the adult. The greatest depth at 
this size is contained about 3.8 times in the standard length, whereas in the adult 
specimens at hand the depth is contained about 4.5 times in the standard length. 
Scales are quite fully developed but are not shown in the accompanying drawing 
because of their extremely small size. The ventral fins reach about two-thirds 
the distance from their insertion to the origin of the anal, whereas in the adult they 
reach only about one-third of this distance. The single finlet, following the dorsal 
and anal fins, in each case is now fully differentiated. The color of preserved sped - 
mens remains almost wholly silvery. Although fish 45 millimeters or so in length 
differ in many respects from the adult, such diagnostic characters as the single 
detached finlet following each the dorsal and the anal; the deep scutes in the pos- 
terior part of the lateral line, the rather small oblique mouth, and the silvery color 
all are developed. It is not very difficult, therefore, to identify 50-millimeter 
specimens with the adult. (Fig. 72.) 
DISTRIBUTION OF YOUNG 
The young ranging from about 2 to 50 millimeters in length, of which numerous 
specimens were secured as stated in another section of this account, were nearly 
all taken at sea at numerous stations extending from the shores of the banks to the 
Gulf Stream. Only 3 fry were taken in the harbor, and these were collected near 
the inlet. The numerous specimens collected by the Albatross and the Fish Hawk, 
consisting mostly of fish ranging from 15 to 50 millimeters in length, so far as this 
information is given, were taken at the surface. ' It is not known that nets suitable 
for taking these small fish were hauled elsewhere than at the surface. However, 
during the systematic collecting with townets carried on from the Beaufort labora- 
tory with smaller vessels from 1927 to 1929, when an approximately equal number 
of drags was made with two 1 -meter nets hauled simultaneously — one at the sur- 
face and the other on the bottom — fry up to 25 millimeters in length were taken in 
the surface net 40 times and in the bottom net 49 times. The number of times the 
fish were taken on the bottom not only is larger but the number of specimens taken 
there is considerably greater. 
It is evident from the collections that the young (up to 25 millimeters in length, 
at least) occur both at the surface and on the bottom, and it seems probable that 
