There now follow four extracts from the Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1964 edition. The information printed here is copyright under International Copyright Union.
The extract taken from the article on FISH, from volume 9, pages 319 to 354, was written by John T Nichols, Former Curator of Fishes, American Museum of Natural History, New York City, and Clark Hubbs, Associate Professor of Zoology, University of Texas.
The complete article on PADDLEFISH, from volume 17, page 22, is not credited.
The extract taken from the article on CHINA, from volume 5, pages 555 to 611, was written by Karl Patterson Schmidt, Chief Curator of Zoology, Chicago Natural History Museum, 1941-55.
The extract taken from the article on ASIA, from volume 2, pages 574 to 604, was written by Lieven Ferdinand De Beaufort, Professor of Zoogeography, University of Amsterdam, Netherlands, 1929-49, Director, Zoological Museum, Amsterdam, 1922-49.
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FISH, as popularly conceived, is any "cold-blooded" aquatic animal that swims by means of fins and breathes by means of gills; it is usually thought of as having scales...
VII. SURVEY OF THE BONY FISHES...
B. RAY-FINNED FISHES...
2. Sturgeons and Paddlefishes.—Other living representatives of ancient types of fishes are the sturgeons (Acipenseridae) and the related paddlefishes (Polyodontidae), belonging to the order Acipenseriformes.
Sturgeons are among the larget fresh-water fishes. Some of the sturgeons, however, descend to and get their growth in the sea. Species that enter American Atlantic and Pacific rivers from the sea were recorded to lengths of 18 ft. and more than 12 ft. respectively, and a Russian species is said to reach 30 ft. It is not unusual for exclusively fresh-water forms to reach more than six feet. The sturgeon has a long snout, with tactile barbels before the mouth; a longitudinal series of bony plates, with nodules between them, instead of scales; fins without spines, the pectoral fins being behind the head, the pelvics far back; a small dorsal fin; an anal below the dorsal, near the tail; and the vertebral column bent upward to form the long upper lobe of the tail fin (heterocercal tail). Thus, in several reports, notably in the shape of the tail fin, sturgeons resemble modern sharks.
The family Acipenseridae is not of great antiquity; it is not known to have occured before the Tertiary period (when more modern fishes were also present), but extinct sturgeonlike fishes ancestral to them go back to Middle Mesozoic, apparently a connecting link with the earlier Palaeoniscidae. Sturgeons are the most generally distributed archaic types of fish still living. They are excellent food fishes, and their roe, made into caviar, is an item of commercial importance.
The North American paddlefish (Polyodon spathula), belonging to the family Polyodontidae, is one of the strangest large fishes living. It has the general colours of a sturgeon, with a similar unsymmetrical heterocercal tail, but its skin is smooth and naked, lacking scales, plates or nodules. It has a large mouth and two very small eyes at the base of a very long, flat, paddle-shaped snout (about half as long as the rest of the head and body). The paddlefish inhabits sluggish waters of the lower Mississippi valley. It grows to be more than four feet long (rarely more than six feet) and weighs between 100 and 200 lb. It has been reduced in numbers by commercial fishing, for its roe, like that of the sturgeon, is sought for caviar.
Polyodon feeds largely on minute free-floating animals (plankton), which are taken into its large mouth and strained through exceptionally long, fine gill rakers; but this is not its only method of feeding, for it will sometimes take a baited hook. The paddle, which is richly supplied with sense organs, doubtless helps in locating food.
Besides the American paddlefish, one similar species, Psephurus gladius, is found in the rivers of China, where it grows to a larger size, sometimes 20 ft. or more.
These two species are generally considered relicts from an age when their family had a more general distribution; though fossil evidence is scant the family goes no further back than the Cretaceous...
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PADDLEFISH, the common name in North America for Polyodon spathula, also called the spoonbill sturgeon, of the Mississippi basin. It reaches a length of 6 ft. and a weight of 150 lb., and has dark-green smooth skin (scales occur only on part of the tail) and a greatly elongate, paddle-shaped snout. It is edible; the roe is made into caviar. Another species is found in China. See STURGEON.
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CHINA, a vast country of eastern Asia, bordering the U.S.S.R. and the Mongolian People's Republic for more than 6,000 mi. on the north and west; it is flanked by Korea on the northeast; the Yellow sea, East China sea and South China sea on the east; Vietnam, Laos and Burma on the south; and the Karakoram and Himalaya ranges on the southwest...
II. PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY...
E. ANIMAL LIFE...
Profusion of vegetation and variety of relief have fostered the development of a fauna of great diversity and have permitted the survival of animals elsewhere extinct. Notable among such survivals are the great paddlefish (Psephurus gladius) of the Yangtze, the small species of alligator in east central China and the giant salamander (related to the Japanese giant salamander and the American hellbender) in western China. The diversity of animal life is perhaps greatest in the ranges and valleys of the Tibetan border, to which region the giant panda is confined. The takin or goat antelope, numerous species of pheasants and a variety of laughing thrushes are to be found in all the Chinese mountains. China also seems to have been one of the chies centres of dispersal of the carp family and also of old world catfishes.
The regional affinities of the Chinese fauna are complex. In the northeast there are relations with the animal life of the Siberian forests. The mongolian deserts bring animals from central Asia into suitable steppe areas in northern China. The life of the great mountain ranges is Palearctic, but with distinctively Chinese species or genera. To the southeast, the lowlands and mountains alike lead directly into the oriental region. This part of China presents a complete transition from the temperate zone Palearctic life to the wealth of tropical forms distinctive of south-eastern Asia. Tropical types of reptiles and amphibians and of birds and mammals predominate in the southernmost Chinese provinces. (See also ASIA: Physical Geography: Animal Life.)...
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ASIA, the largest of the continents with an area of 17,139,445 sq.mi., has as its conventional western boundaries the Ural mountains and Ural river to the Caspian sea, the Caucasus to the Black sea, the Mediterranean coasts of Asia Minor and the Levant, and the Red sea...
I. PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY...
E. ANIMAL LIFE...
The mountains and the plateau to the north of the Himalayas have a mountain fauna which partly reaches the Himalayas proper. Many kinds of wild sheep and goats live there. Tibet is home of the yak.
The eastern part of the Palearctic region—Manchuria and eastern China—has several peculiar kinds of deer. The giant panda inhabits parts of China bordering Tibet; the lesser panda is a Himalayan animal. From the wastelands of the higher Himalayas came many legendary accounts of the "abominable snowman" (q.v.).
The large rivers of China have a rich fish fauna among which Psephurus gladius from the Yangtze and Yellow rivers is of interest, as it is one of the two survivors of an otherwise extinct family, the other being the Paddlefish (Polyodon spathula) of North America. Another fresh-water animal, its nearest relative living in North America, is the giant salamander (Megalobatrachus) from Chinese and Japanese waters...