Acknowledgments

In a study of this nature one becomes indebted to many institutions and individuals for their assistance.

The Marine Department chartered the trawler Miss Southland, for which grateful thanks are offered. Their officers at Bluff, in particular Mr G. C. Crowther, were most co-operative in forwarding live oysters and collecting fishes, and arranging for a day's dredging on the Kumea. It would have been impossible to undertake this study without their assistance.

I would also like to thank the Internal Research Fund Committee, Victoria University, for the grant (9/64) which enabled me to spend a week at Bluff during May, 1964.

Professor H. W. Manter, University of Nebraska (U.S.A.), and Dr Sewell Hopkins, Texas A. and M. College (U.S.A.), made many helpful suggestions during the course of this study. For this assistance I am indeed grateful.

Finally, I would like to express my gratitude to Drs P. H. J. Castle, J. A. F. Garrick and R. B. Pike for helpful criticisms of various sections of the manuscript; Mr J. M. Moreland for identifying fishes; and the staff of the Victoria University of Wellington Library for assistance with literature. Publication of this paper has been assisted by a grant from the Victoria University Publications Fund.