Mastacembelidae
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Mastacembelidae
The Mastacembelidae are a family of fishes, known as the spiny eels. The Mastacembelids are part of the Order Synbranchiformes, the swamp eels, which are part of the Actinopterygii (ray-finned fishes). In an evaluation of the family in 2004, the subfamilies of Mastacembelidae were found to not be well supported and were rejected. Also, the genera ''Caecomastacembelus'' and ''Aethiomastacembelus'' were placed in synonymy with ''Mastacembelus''. These fish originate from Africa, and southern and eastern Asia. Spiny eels generally inhabit soft-bottomed habitats in fresh and occasionally brackish water. Some species burrow in the substrate during the day or for certain months and have been found buried in soil in drying periods. These fish have an eel-like body. The largest species can reach a maximum length of . Very characteristic of this group is the long nose appendage with two tubulated nostrils. Mastacembelids have a series of well-separated dorsal spines on their back, hence ...
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Mastacembelus
''Mastacembelus'' is a genus of many species of spiny eel fish from the family Mastacembelidae. They are native to Africa (c. 45 species) and Asia (c. 15 species). Most are found in rivers and associated systems (even in rapids), but there are also species in other freshwater habitats and a particularly rich radiation is found in the Lake Tanganyika basin with 15 species (14 endemic). A few species can even occur in brackish water. Appearance The size and pattern varies greatly depending on the exact species of ''Mastacembelus''. The smallest are '' M. latens'' and '' M. simba'', which only reach a maximum total length of . At up to , the largest of both the family and this genus is '' M. erythrotaenia''. ''M. erythrotaenia'', often known as the fire eel, is blackish with an orange-red pattern, and it is a popular aquarium fish. Otherwise species in this genus are typically brownish and often have a spotted, speckled or mottled pattern, either in another brown hue, grayish or ...
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Macrognathus
''Macrognathus'' is a genus of eel-like fish of the family Mastacembelidae of the order Synbranchiformes. These fish are distributed throughout most of South and Southeast Asia. ''Macrognathus'' species feed on small aquatic insect larvae as well as oligochaetes. Appearance and anatomy Most ''Macrognathus'' species attain in length, but a few surpass this size, with the largest being ''M. aral'' at up to . ''Macrognathus'' are mostly similar to '' Mastacembelus''. However, they differ in a more modified rostrum, which may be slightly to significantly larger and longer than those found in ''Mastacembelus''. This serves not only to find food but also to help gather food. In the aquarium A number of species of this genus are popular aquarium fish. These include the lesser spiny eel, ''Macrognathus aculeatus'', the spotfinned spiny eel, ''Macrognathus siamensis'', as well as others. Species According to FishBase, there are currently 25 recognized species in this genus. Accor ...
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Synbranchiformes
Synbranchiformes, often called swamp eels, though that name can also refer specifically to Synbranchidae, is an order of ray-finned fishes that are eel-like but have spiny rays, indicating that they belong to the superorder Acanthopterygii. Taxonomy No synbrachiform fossil is known. The Mastacembeloidei were removed from the Perciformes and added to the Synbranchiformes after a phylogenetic analysis by Johnson and Patterson. These authors consider the Synbranchiformes to be part of a monophyletic group called Smegmamorpha, also containing Mugilimorpha, Atherinomorpha, Gasterosteiformes, and Elassomatidae. Later authors have proposed that the Synbranchiformes along with the Anabantiformes, Carangiformes, Istiophoriformes and Pleuronectiformes form a sister clade to the Ovalentaria which has been called the "Carangimorpharia" but in the 5th Edition of Fishes of the World this clade remained unnamed and unranked. There are a total of about 99 species divided over 15 gene ...
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Fire Eel
The fire eel (''Mastacembelus erythrotaenia'') is a relatively large species of spiny eel. This omnivorous freshwater fish is native to Southeast Asia but is also found in the aquarium trade. Although it has declined locally (especially in parts of Cambodia and Thailand) due to overfishing, it remains common overall. Description The fire eel is not a true eel, but an extremely elongated fish with a distinctive pointed snout and underslung mouth. It is part of Mastacembelidae, spiny eels Family (biology), family, Mastacembelidae. The group gets its common name from the many small dorsal spines that precede the dorsal fin. The body is laterally compressed, particularly the rear third, where it flattens as it joins the caudal fin and forms an extended tail. The fire eel's base coloring is dark brown/grey, while the belly is generally a lighter shade of the same color. Several bright red lateral stripes and spots mark the body and vary in intensity depending on the age and condition ...
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Sinobdella
''Sinobdella'' is a genus of spiny eels, often considered monotypic, containing only ''S. sinensis'' though Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes includes five species: The placement of this genus has been debated. It is placed in Mastacembelidae as the sister group to the rest of the family. This species has been placed as a member of the family Chaudhuriidae Chaudhuriidae, is a family (biology), family of small freshwater eel-like fish related to the swamp eels and spiny eels, commonly known as the earthworm eels. The known species are literally the size and shape of earthworms, thus the family name. ..., but the evidence for this relationship is not strong. References {{Taxonbar, from=Q19851161 Fish genera Taxa described in 1994 Taxa named by Maurice Kottelat ...
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Macrognathus Siamensis
''Macrognathus siamensis'', the peacock eel or spotfin spiny eel, is a spiny eel found in freshwater habitats throughout Southeast Asia. They are commercially important as food and aquarium fish. Distribution The peacock eel is native to the Mekong and Chao Phraya basins, which make up the countries of Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam. They are mostly found in slow-moving backwaters that have a sandy or muddy bottom, such as swamps, canals, and ponds. There is an invasive population of peacock eels in the Everglades region of Florida, most likely being released due to the aquarium trade. The eels were first discovered in the C-111 canal in 2002, and in 2004 were also found to inhabit mangrove swamps further south. Description These fish lack scales and require a soft substrate to burrow into, such as sand, mud, or silt. They breed during the wet season when adjacent forests flood. Larvae reach 8 cm (2 in) in length in approximately 60 days after hatching. This ...
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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 estuaries, or it may occur in brackish fossil aquifers. The word comes from the Middle Dutch root '' brak''. Certain human activities can produce brackish water, in particular civil engineering projects such as dikes and the flooding of coastal marshland to produce brackish water pools for freshwater prawn farming. Brackish water is also the primary waste product of the salinity gradient power process. Because brackish water is hostile to the growth of most terrestrial plant species, without appropriate management it can be damaging to the environment (see article on shrimp farms). Technically, brackish water contains between 0.5 and 30 grams of salt per litre—more often expressed as 0.5 to 30 parts per thousand (‰), which is a spec ...
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John Wiley & Sons
John Wiley & Sons, Inc., commonly known as Wiley (), is an American Multinational corporation, multinational Publishing, publishing company that focuses on academic publishing and instructional materials. The company was founded in 1807 and produces books, Academic journal, journals, and encyclopedias, in print and electronically, as well as online products and services, training materials, and educational materials for undergraduate, graduate, and continuing education students. History The company was established in 1807 when Charles Wiley opened a print shop in Manhattan. The company was the publisher of 19th century American literary figures like James Fenimore Cooper, Washington Irving, Herman Melville, and Edgar Allan Poe, as well as of legal, religious, and other non-fiction titles. The firm took its current name in 1865. Wiley later shifted its focus to scientific, Technology, technical, and engineering subject areas, abandoning its literary interests. Wiley's son Joh ...
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Fishes Of The World
''Fishes of the World'' is a standard reference for the systematics of fishes. It was first written in 1976 by the American ichthyologist Joseph S. Nelson (1937–2011). Now in its fifth edition (2016), the work is a comprehensive overview of the diversity and classification of the 30,000-plus fish species known to science. The book begins with a general overview of ichthyology, although it is not self-contained. After a short section on Chordata and non-fish taxa, the work lists all known fish families in a systematic fashion. Each family is given at least one paragraph, and usually a body outline drawing; large families have subfamilies and tribes described as well. Notable genera and species are mentioned, though the book does generally not deal with the species-level diversity. The complexities of the higher taxa are described succinctly, with many references for difficult points. The book does not contain any color illustrations. The fourth edition was the first to inco ...
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Aquarium
An aquarium (: aquariums or aquaria) is a vivarium of any size having at least one transparent side in which aquatic plants or animals are kept and displayed. fishkeeping, Fishkeepers use aquaria to keep fish, invertebrates, amphibians, aquatic reptiles, such as turtles, and aquatic plants. The term ''aquarium'', coined by English naturalist Philip Henry Gosse, combines the Latin root , meaning 'water', with the suffix , meaning 'a place for relating to'. The aquarium principle was fully developed in 1850 by the chemist Robert Warington, who explained that plants added to water in a container would give off enough oxygen to support animals, so long as the numbers of animals did not grow too large. The aquarium craze was launched in early Victorian era, Victorian England by Gosse, who created and stocked the first public aquarium at the London Zoo in 1853, and published the first manual, ''The Aquarium: An Unveiling of the Wonders of the Deep Sea'' in 1854. Small aquariums are k ...
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Food Fish
Many species of fish are caught by humans and consumed as food in virtually all regions around the world. Their meat has been an important dietary source of protein and other nutrients in the human diet. The English language does not have a special culinary name for food prepared from fish like with other animals (as with '' pig'' vs. ''pork''), or as in other languages (such as Spanish '' pez'' vs. '' pescado''). In culinary and fishery contexts, ''fish'' may include so-called shellfish such as molluscs, crustaceans, and echinoderms; but, more expansively, ''seafood'' covers both fish and other marine life used as food. Since 1961, the average annual increase in global apparent food fish consumption (3.2 percent) has outpaced population growth (1.6 percent) and exceeded the increase in consumption of meat from all terrestrial animals except poultry (4.9 percent), both combined (2.8 percent) and individually (bovine, ovine, porcine, et cetera). In ''per capita'' terms, food f ...
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