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- Purple marsh crabs are significantly disrupting carbon cycling in salt marshes along the East Coast of the U.S., according to a study led by Batten School & VIMS scientists.
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- As an expression of parental pride in their daughter, Taylor Spencer ‘83 and Martha Spencer recently established an undergraduate field research endowment at the Batten School & VIMS.
  
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Inshore lizardfish

Synodus foetens

Information and species illustrations courtesy of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).

Species Information
Size Maximum size to about 40 cm; commonly to about 30 cm; world game record 0.9 kg.
Diagnostic characters
Habitat, biology, and fisheries Inhabits shallow inshore waters in salt-water creeks, rivers, bays, and sounds and along open beaches on mud or sand bottoms; also ranges out over the continental shelf to depths of 180 m. A voracious predator that buries itself in the sand or mud to ambush prey; feeds mainly on fishes and small mobile invertebrates. Apparently a seasonal migrant in the northern part of its range. Of little importance to fisheries; taken incidentally in shrimp trawls and seldom marketed.
Distribution Widely distributed along the Atlantic coast of the American continents from the vicinity of Cape Cod to Brazil, including Bermuda and the Caribbean Sea.
Citations Carpenter, K.E. (ed) The living marine resources of the Western Central Atlantic. Volume 1: Introduction, molluscs, crustaceans, hagfishes, sharks, batoid fishes, and chimaeras. FAO Species Identification Guide for Fishery Purposes and American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists Special Publication No. 5. Rome, FAO. 2002. pp. 1-600. Carpenter, K.E. (ed) The living marine resources of the Western Central Atlantic. Volume 2: Bony fishes part 1 (Acipenseridae to Grammatidae). FAO Species Identification Guide for Fishery Purposes and American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists Special Publication No. 5. Rome, FAO. 2002. pp. 601-1374. Carpenter, K.E. (ed) The living marine resources of the Western Central Atlantic. Volume 3: Bony fishes part 2 (Opistognathidae to Molidae), sea turtles and marine mammals. FAO Species Identification Guide for Fishery Purposes and American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists Special Publication No. 5. Rome, FAO. 2002. pp. 1375-2127.