The gwyniad (''Coregonus pennantii''), or Welsh whitefish, is a species of freshwater

ray-finned fish Actinopterygii (; ), members of which are known as ray-finned fish or actinopterygians, is a class of bony fish that comprise over 50% of living vertebrate species. They are so called because of their lightly built fins made of webbings of sk ...

belonging to the

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

Salmonidae Salmonidae (, ) is a family (biology), family of ray-finned fish, the only extant member of the suborder Salmonoidei, consisting of 11 extant genera and over 200 species collectively known as "salmonids" or "salmonoids". The family includes salmo ...

, which includes the salmon, trouts and related fishes. This species is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found only in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also foun ...

to a single lake in northern Wales.

Taxonomy

The gwyniad was first formally described in 1848 by the French

zoologist Zoology ( , ) is the scientific study of animals. Its studies include the structure, embryology, classification, habits, and distribution of all animals, both living and extinct, and how they interact with their ecosystems. Zoology is one ...

Achille Valenciennes Achille Valenciennes (9 August 1794 – 13 April 1865) was a French zoology, zoologist. Valenciennes was born in Paris, and studied under Georges Cuvier. His study of parasitic worms in humans made an important contribution to the study of parasi ...

in volume 21 of the '' Histoire naturelle des poissons'', cowritten with

Georges Cuvier Jean Léopold Nicolas Frédéric, baron Cuvier (23 August 1769 – 13 May 1832), known as Georges Cuvier (; ), was a French natural history, naturalist and zoology, zoologist, sometimes referred to as the "founding father of paleontology". Cuv ...

. Valenciennes gave the type locality as Wales. This fish is classified in the

Holarctic The Holarctic realm is a biogeographic realm that comprises the majority of habitats found throughout the continents in the Northern Hemisphere. It corresponds to the floristic Boreal Kingdom. It includes both the Nearctic zoogeographical reg ...

whitefish genus '' Coregonus'' which is classified in the

subfamily In biological classification, a subfamily (Latin: ', plural ') is an auxiliary (intermediate) taxonomic rank, next below family but more inclusive than genus. Standard nomenclature rules end botanical subfamily names with "-oideae", and zo ...

Coregoninae of the family Salmonidae. The taxonomy of the genus ''Coregonus'' is disputed; some authorities assign the gwyniad to the common whitefish (''Coregonus lavaretus''), and a morphological review in 2012 was unable to find any solid evidence for recognizing the gwyniad as a separate species. Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes,

FishBase FishBase is a global species database of fish species (specifically finfish). It is the largest and most extensively accessed online database on adult finfish on the web.

and the

IUCN The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. Founded in 1948, IUCN has become the global authority on the status ...

list it as a distinct species, ''C. pennantii''.

Etymology

The gwyniad belongs to the genus ''Coregonus'', this name was coined by Peter Artedi in 1738 for ''C. lavaretus'' and combines ''core'', derived from ''kórē'' which means the pupil in Greek, with ''gōnía'', an "angle" or "corner", an allusion to the front part of the pupil protruding at an acute angle. The specific name, ''pennantii'', honours the Welsh

naturalist Natural history is a domain of inquiry involving organisms, including animals, fungi, and plants, in their natural environment, leaning more towards observational than experimental methods of study. A person who studies natural history is cal ...

and

author In legal discourse, an author is the creator of an original work that has been published, whether that work exists in written, graphic, visual, or recorded form. The act of creating such a work is referred to as authorship. Therefore, a sculpt ...

Thomas Pennant Thomas Pennant (16 December 1798) was a Welsh natural history, naturalist, traveller, writer and antiquarian. He was born and lived his whole life at his family estate, Downing Hall, near Whitford, Flintshire, in Wales. As a naturalist he had ...

who wrote about the gwyniad in 1769, referring to it as ''C. lavaretus''.

Distribution and habitat

The gwyniad is endemic to Llyn Tegid, or Bala Lake, in the upper drainage system of the River Dee in the county of Gywnedd in north Wales. This species is found in the benthopelagic zone in the deeper parts of the two lakes it now inhabits but it undertakes daily vertical migrations to forage nearer the surface in the warmer months of the year.

Conservation

The gwyniad is threatened by deteriorating water quality in Bala Lake and by the ruffe (''Gymnocephalus cernua''), a fish introduced to the lake in the 1980s and now eating the eggs and fry of gwyniad. As a conservation measure, eggs of gwyniad were transferred to Llyn Arenig Fawr, a nearby reservoir, between 2003 and 2007.

References

External links