Atlas wczesnych stadiów rozwojowych ryb. 34 gatunki ryb Bałtyku Południowego i jego zalewów. | Atlas of juvenile fish stages. 34 fish species of the Southern Baltic and its adjacent lagoons.

The literature on identifying larval fish also includes short publications that usually focus on one to several species, as well as detailed keys that present analytical methods for classifying larvae. The number of publications addressing the species identifi cation early life stages of fi sh and referring exclusively to those in the Baltic Sea is relatively small. In most instances, these are publications on the North Sea supplemented with information pertaining to the Baltic Sea. The fi rst wide-ranging work from this fi eld is the book by Ehrenbaum of 1905-1909 which features detailed drawings of fi sh eggs and larvae. Valuable resource is the key by Kazanova 1953 in Russian for the fi sh of the Baltic Sea and its estuaries including useful illustrations especially of herring and sprat larvae. The Atlas larw ryb Bałtyku [Atlas of Larval Baltic Fish] by Mańkowski (1964) in Polish, which is based on the work of Ehrenbaum, is still used widely today. Currently, the basic source of information on juvenile stages of marine fi sh is the key by Russell (1976) that is based on the waters in the vicinity of the British Isles. The following keys are available from the ICES (International Council for the Exploration of the Sea) for certain families of marine fi sh: Clupeidae (Saville, 1964), Ammodytidae (Macer, 1967), Pleuronectidae (Nichols, 1971). The recent publication of a key for North Sea species (Munk and Nielsen, 2005) in which the authors systematize knowledge to date, is valuable resource. The key published by Pinder (2001) dealing with species occurring in the waters of the British Isles is widely used for identifi cation of freshwater fi sh eggs and larvae but especially good are keys by Koblickaya (1981) and Makeeva et.al (2011) in Russian. The publications by Urho (1992, 1996) focus on diff erentiating larvae of brackish water fish. The aim of the book was to supplement the literature dedicated to identifying larval and juvenile fish stages. The book focuses on the species occurring in the southern Baltic Sea and the adjacent Vistula and Szczecin lagoons. The fish described include typically marine species such as cod Gadus morhua, and sprat Sprattus sprattus; freshwater species such as pikeperch Sander lucioperca, and perch Perca fl uviatilis and marine fish that spawn intensively in, among other areas, the brackish waters of the lagoons – such as herring Clupea harengus. Information is included regarding round goby Neogobius melanostomus, the invasive species, which is equally successful inhabiting the coastal waters of the Baltic as the nearly-fresh waters of the lagoons. This book includes 34 fish species belonging to 20 families. While this book does not present a systematic, step-by-step protocol for identifying larvae, it does draw together information that should make this task significantly easier. Most of the published literature includes line drawings, and while this form of presenting morphology does have its merits in that it permits highlighting individual structural characters or pigmentation, it does not always present a full picture of reality. The information presented in this book, which is based on the literature and photographs, should facilitate signifi cantly the work of those interested in studies that require identifying the species of eggs and larvae of fish. The atlas would be a valuable addition to the available literature on early life stages of fish from the waters of the southern Baltic Sea and its lagoons.

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