  We present the results of a spectroscopic survey of 675 bright (16.5<Bj<18)
galaxies in a 6 degree field centred on the Fornax cluster with the FLAIR-II
spectrograph on the UK Schmidt Telescope. We measured redshifts for 516
galaxies of which 108 were members of the Fornax Cluster. Nine of these are new
cluster members previously misidentified as background galaxies. The cluster
dynamics show that the dwarf galaxies are still falling into the cluster
whereas the giants are virialised. Our spectral data reveal a higher rate of
star formation among the dwarf galaxies than suggested by morphological
classification: 35 per cent have H-alpha emission indicative of star formation
but only 19 per cent were morphologically classified as late-types. The
distribution of scale sizes is consistent with evolutionary processes which
transform late-type dwarfs to early-type dwarfs. The fraction of dwarfs with
active star formation drops rapidly towards the cluster centre. The
star-forming dwarfs are concentrated in the outer regions of the cluster, the
most extreme in an infalling subcluster. We estimate gas depletion time scales
for 5 dwarfs with detected HI emission: these are long (of order 10 Gyr),
indicating that active gas removal must be involved if they are transformed
into gas-poor dwarfs as they fall further into the cluster. In agreement with
our previous results, we find no compact dwarf elliptical (M32-like) galaxies
in the Fornax Cluster.
