swuklink.com: Sand Smelt or Silversides

SAND SMELT or SILVERSIDESAtherina presbyter

The sand smelt, sometimes know as silversides, Atherina presbyter.

Slim-bodied fish, with small head but having large eyes. Colouration of the back and upper sides are a translucent green with black specks on the scale edges, with an intense broad silvery band across the sides (hence to common name Silversides), that passes into the white of the belly.

This common inshore fish is associated with estuaries, unpolluted harbours and saline lagoons, tending to be found over sandy or muddy bottoms, down to 20m or so. Juveniles are often found in rock intertidal pools, swimming in closely packed shoals. Adults may often be observed at night, at the surface, almost hanging motionless facing in the direction of the tidal current.

Common in the southern North Sea and English Channel, rarer further north.

Spawns from May into July, with some spawning taking place in large intertidal pools, whilst most occurs in coastal lagoons.

Class: Osteichthyes

Order: Perciformes

Family:

Genus: Atherina

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1983		Sand Smelt (Atherina presbyter) studied in Fleet Lagoon, Dorset
	BAAAGCQY BAAAGBYT

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