#MACKEREL FISH SKIN#

ĭespite their great activity, they do not leap above the surface, as various others of their tribe do, unless perhaps to escape So much oxygen for their vital processes that when the water is warm (hence its oxygen content low) they must keep swimmingĬonstantly, to bring sufficient flow of water to their gill filaments, or else they die. When caught they beat a rapid tattoo with their tails on the bottom of the boat until exhausted. Mackerel are a swift-moving fish, swimming with very short sidewise movements of the rear part of the body and of the powerfulĬaudal fin. The schooner Henrietta brought in one weighing 7 ½ pounds.

An unusually large mackerel is taken occasionally in 1925, for example, Fourteen-inch fish weighĪbout 1 pound in the spring and about 1 ¼ pounds in the fall when they are fat 18-inch fish weigh about 2 to 2 ½ pounds a 22-inch mackerel will likely weigh 4 pounds. Most of the grown fish are between 14 and 18 inches long a few reach a length close to 22 inches.

But the iridescent colors fade so rapidly after death that a dead fish gives little idea of the brilliance of a living one. Reflections and iridescence the belly silvery white. The lower parts of the sides are white with silvery, coppery, or brassy The pectorals are black or dusky at the base, the dorsals and caudal are Running along each side from pectoral to tail fin. The body is barred with 23 to 33 (usuallyĢ7 to 30) dark transverse bands that run down in an irregular wavy course nearly to the mid-level of the body, below which there is a narrow dark streak The upper surface is dark steely to greenish blue, often almost blue-black on the head.

#MACKEREL FISH SKIN#

The scales of the mackerel are so small that its skin feels velvety to the touch indeed they are hardly to be seen on theīelly with the naked eye, but those about the pectoral fins and on the shoulders are somewhat larger. The ventral fins stand below the origin of the first dorsal and are small, as are the pectorals. The caudal peduncle bears two small longitudinal keels on either side but no median lateral keel, the absence of the latterīeing a distinctive character. The caudal fin is broad, but short and deeply forked. Small finlets that correspond to the dorsal finlets in size and shape. TheĪnal fin is similar to the second dorsal in shape and size, originates slightly behind it, and is similarly succeeded by 5 (9 to 15 rays, usually 12) and is followed by several small finlets, of which there are usually 5, but sometimes 4 or 6. In a deep groove the second dorsal, separated from the first by an interspace longer than the length of the latter, is smaller Is triangular, of 10 to 14 (usually 11, 12, or 13) rather weak spines that can be laid down along the midline of the back There are two large dorsal fins: the first originating over the middle of the pectoral fins when the latter are laid back gelatinous mass in the form of two scales, a forward and a hinder, which cover the eye except for a perpendicular slit over The eye is large, and the hollows in front of and behind it are filled with the so-called 'adipose eyelid,' a transparent, (the premaxillaries are not protractile), while the jaws, which are of equal length, are armed with small, sharp, slender Its head is long (one-fourth of length to caudal) and its mouth large, gaping back to the middle of the eye

Is about four and one-half to five and one-half times as long as it is deep, oval in section, thick and firm-muscled as areĪll its tribe. The mackerel is fusiform in outline, tapering rearward to a very slim caudal peduncle and forward to a pointed nose. A, egg (European), after Holt B, larva, 3.5 mm. Figure 175.-Mackerel ( Scomber scombrus).

Mackerel fish