The population dynamics and energetics of a species of pelagic Antarctic fish, Pagothenia borchgrevinki - length, weight, stomach content, parasites, fecundity, pattern of feeding, respiration experiments

On two days, a series of fish were caught at six hourly intervals to see if there was any diurnal pattern in feeding behaviour. A reference collection of under-ice plankton was made for comparison with stomach contents of the fish and other plankton were frozen for later determination of their calorific values. An additional 200 fish were caught, frozen whole and returned to New Zealand to obtain further information on populaton dynamics and bomb calorimetry.

Respiration experiments were carried out using different size class of fish placed in a respirometer and lowered 2m below the sea ice. Respiration rate was determined by measuring the oxygen depletion in a closed system. Parasites were collected from some of the fish caught including copepods, leeches, cestodes, trematodes, nematodes and monogenea.

Parasites were prepared for identification and for demonstration slides used in teaching.