Abstract
THE letter of Dr. G. P. Bidder in NATURE for January 31, p. 155, on “Constant Differential Growth-ratios and their Significance”, raises the very interesting question: Are plaice potentially immortal? In other words, does senile decay occur? This might be decided directly by cytological investigation of old fish; but there is another indirect aspect of the question which my own work on plaice suggests as worthy of being brought forward in this connexion; namely, the differential death-rate of the sexes. Dealing with large collections from two regions, the North Sea and western part of the English Channel respectively, I showed (International Investigations: Marine Biological Association, Report III. 1906–8 (1911)) that in each region males were more numerous than females up to the age at which the majority of males become mature for the first time; after which, or soon after which, females begin to preponderate, the number of males diminishing somewhat rapidly.
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WALLACE, W. The Mortality of Plaice. Nature 115, 337 (1925). https://doi.org/10.1038/115337a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/115337a0
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