First Record in Scotland of the Leopard-spotted Goby, Thorogobius ephippiatus

Abstract

THE leopard-spotted goby was first discovered by G. R. Forster of the Plymouth laboratory of the Marine Biological Association in 1955, and was described as a new species, Gobius forsteri, by Corbin¹. It is interesting that the original record was made while aqualung diving, and that subsequent evidence of the occurrence of the fish around British coasts has continued to be provided largely by divers' sightings and photographs. The apparent restriction of this locally common fish to crevices in rocky sublittoral areas had evidently prevented its discovery by conventional means of collection such as dredges and trawls, which are notoriously inefficient at sampling this type of substrate.