Abstract
IN his presidential address to Section D (Zoology), Dr. Stanley Kemp directs attention to the great fluctuations in the abundance of marine animals and to the need for further study of their causes. Normal annual fluctuations, due for the most part to events which occur in the early stages of the animal's life, may be very great: it is not uncommon to find that one year-class of fish is fifty times as abundant as another. The evidence at present available, drawn from the incidence of good and bad survival years in a few of the more important European fishes, is that these annual fluctuations are strictly localized-a certain species in a particular place will be affected in one way, while another species in the same place, or the same species in another place, will be affected in a different way.
Article PDF
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Fluctuations in the Abundance of Marine Animals. Nature 142, 341–342 (1938). https://doi.org/10.1038/142341a0
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/142341a0