Snowy Grouper Feeding 
103 
were recovered intact. Eighteen contained food, represented by de- 
capod crustaceans (78% of number; 72% of volume) and unidenti- 
fied fish (20% of total prey number; 28% of volume). Identifiable 
food items included one Spanish lobster ( Scyllarus depressus) (Smith) 
and brachyuran crabs: Acanthocarpus alexandri Stimpson, Calappa 
angusta Milne Edwards, Calappa flammea (Herbst), Iliacantha 
subglobosa Stimpson, Ovalipes stephensoni Williams, and Portunus 
spinicarpus (Stimpson) (Duke University Marine Laboratory 1982, 
South Carolina Wildlife Marine Resources Department and Duke Uni- 
versity Marine Laboratory 1982, Parrish 1987). Food items were 
collected primarily from the outer shelf in summer from headboats 
operating in 37-110 m (R. Matheson III, personal communication). 
The North Carolina BLM effort produced only 14 intact stomachs, 
two of which contained food (Duke University Marine Laboratory 
1982). The South Carolina and Georgia BLM outer shelf project 
obtained no snowy grouper stomachs with food (South Carolina Wild- 
life Marine Resources Department 1982). 
The only other E. niveatus feeding study conducted in the 
southeastern United States was an analysis of intestinal tracts of 26 
snowy grouper from the lower Florida Keys (Bielsa 1982). Speci- 
mens were collected from May through October at 123-256 m. Fish, 
primarily pelagic species, dominated (43% of prey number; 47% of 
total volume). Cephalopods ranked second in numerical importance 
(21%), although brachyuran crabs were second in volumetric impor- 
tance (32%). 
Problems associated with sampling snowy grouper for food items 
include fish availability, condition of the fish at dockside, and stomach 
eversion resulting from embolism. Adult snowy grouper are uncom- 
mon in trawl catches (Bullis and Thompson 1965, Barans and Bur- 
rell 1976, Keiser 1976, Cupka et al. 1977), and hook-and-line sampling 
on small, patch reefs from large research vessels has proven expen- 
sive, labor intensive, and ineffective in providing sufficient samples 
for food analysis (R. Matheson III, personal communication; C. 
Manooch III, personal observation). Snowy grouper with intact 
stomachs are rarely brought to commercial docks because groupers 
normally are gutted and iced at sea. Ungutted snowy grouper caught 
by headboat anglers do reach the dock. However, they are not abundant 
and are now caught almost exclusively in waters less than 100 m 
where few large fish are found. Visual observations of snowy grou- 
per feeding behavior have been limited to a single submersible 
observation of individuals near a reef in 125-137 m off North Carolina 
(Parker and Ross 1986). 
