Marlene Burrows , age 14, of Peterborough, for her question

Are a halibut's eyes on his back?

Imagine a flounder ten feet long and weighing 450 pounds. This gives you some idea of a good sized halibut and explains why we do not see the whole fish displayed in the market. Like the flounder and the smaller flatfish, the halibut has tender white meat. Ha also has the same kind of funny lopsided face   only bigger. Actually, his back is the narrow ridge down his spine, topped with a ribbon like fin. One flay side is milky white, the other darkish grey. His eyes and his lopsided mouth are on the grey side.

The flounder, sole and other flatfish belong to the order Heterosomata, a name which means the unusual bodied ones. However, they do not start off life in any unusual way. Their kindergarten days are spent swimming around just like normal fish.

The halibut begins life as a rather large fish egg, about one eighth of an inch wide. Mama Halibut may lay up to three million of these eggs in a single season. Most of them become food for bigger fish. All of them float out into deep water.

A lucky egg here and there hatches into a fish larva. It is a little creature clear as glass swimming about looking just like the larvae of countless other fishes. He has a normal mouth and an eye on each side of his face. After a little while, however, the young halibut begins to swim on his side. Soon after this, the eye on the right side begins to sag low on his face. The eye on the left side begins to rise up to the top of his head. The toothy little mouth begins to twist to one side.

The left eye moves higher and higher, clear over the little fish's head until it joins the eye on the right aide of the face. The youngster is now a miniature copy of his giant Mama, all ready to join his adult relatives near the shore.

He rises to the surface of the deep ocean arid lets the wind, current and tides take him to the shallow coastal waters*

Here the young halibut sinks to the bottom. He rests on his pale white blind side with the eyes and lopsided mouth uppermost. Food is plentiful and he eats and grows. It may take ham twelve years to reach his full side of about 40 pounds. Has sisters will grow much bigger. He can crack clams and mussels in his strong haws and when fully grown he can stun a codfish with a flick of his powerful tail.

Halibut like cool shallow watEra and they are hunted off our northern shores in both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. The fishing boats are fitted with strong lines and hooks which are trailed along the bottom. We harvest about 25,000 tons of this delicious big flatfish every year.