Emmelichthyidae

Emmelichthyidae
Rubyfish (Plagiogeneion rubiginosum)
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Actinopterygii
Order: Perciformes
Family: Emmelichthyidae
D. S. Jordan, 1923
Genera[1]

The Emmelichthyidae are a family of small to medium-sized marine fish known commonly as rovers.[2] The family was once much larger, including a wide range of plankton-eating fish, but most of the genera were discovered to be unrelated examples of parallel evolution, and were moved to other families.[3]

The rovers are distributed in tropical and warmer temperate waters in the Indo-Pacific, southern Pacific, eastern Atlantic, and Caribbean Sea.[4]

These fish have protrusible, toothless or nearly toothless jaws, long dorsal fins, and forked tail fins with lobes that fold in like scissors. The largest species reach about 50 centimeters in length.[4]

See also

References

  1. ↑ Froese, Rainer, and Daniel Pauly, eds. (2013). "Emmelichthyidae" in FishBase. April 2013 version.
  2. ↑ Heemstra, PC; Randall, JE (1977). "A revision of the Emmelichthyidae (Pisces : Perciformes)". Marine and Freshwater Research 28 (3): 361. doi:10.1071/MF9770361. ISSN 1323-1650.
  3. ↑ Johnson, G.D. & Gill, A.C. (1998). Paxton, J.R. & Eschmeyer, W.N., ed. Encyclopedia of Fishes. San Diego: Academic Press. p. 184. ISBN 0-12-547665-5.
  4. 1 2 WoRMS (2014). Emmelichthyidae. In: Froese, R. and D. Pauly, Editors. FishBase. Accessed through: World Register of Marine Species.
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