''Proterorhinus'' is a genus of fishes, known as the tubenose gobies. These gobiid fish are native to

Eurasia Eurasia ( , ) is a continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. According to some geographers, Physical geography, physiographically, Eurasia is a single supercontinent. The concept of Europe and Asia as distinct continents d ...

where they occur in the region of the

Caspian Caspian can refer to: *The Caspian Sea *The Caspian Depression, surrounding the northern part of the Caspian Sea *The Caspians, the ancient people living near the Caspian Sea *The Caspian languages spoken in northern Iran and southeastern Azerbaij ...

and

Black Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''P ...

seas, inhabiting marine,

brackish Brackish water, sometimes termed brack water, is water occurring in a natural environment that has more salinity than freshwater, but not as much as seawater. It may result from mixing seawater (salt water) and fresh water together, as in estuari ...

and fresh waters. The species '' Proterorhinus semilunaris'' (previously referred to as ''P. marmoratus'') was introduced to the

St. Clair River The St. Clair River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed November 7, 2011 river in central North America which flows from Lake Huron into Lake St. Clair, forming part ...

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

during the late 1990s. Until recently, the genus was considered

monotypic In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unisp ...

, comprising only the tubenose goby ('' Proterorhinus marmoratus''). Following molecular and further morphological investigations it has been split into several taxa, with distinct distributions in marine vs. fresh waters and in the Black Sea vs. Caspian Sea basins.

Species

There are five recognized species in this genus: * '' Proterorhinus marmoratus'' (

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, 1814) (tubenose goby) * '' Proterorhinus nasalis'' ( De Filippi, 1863) (eastern tubenose goby) * '' Proterorhinus semilunaris'' ( Heckel, 1837) (western tubenose goby) * '' Proterorhinus semipellucidus'' ( Kessler, 1863) ('' P. nasalis'').Brian W. Coad
Freshwater Fishes of Iran
(accessed 22 Feb 2015) * '' Proterorhinus tataricus'' Freyhof & Naseka, 2007 (Chornaya tubenose goby)Freyhof J., Naseka A.M. (2007) ''Proterorhinus tataricus'', a new tubenose goby from Crimea, Ukraine (Teleostei: Gobiidae). Ichthyological Exploration of Freshwaters, 18(4): 325–33

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References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q510079 Proterorhinus, Benthophilinae Taxonomy articles created by Polbot