The sohal surgeonfish (''Acanthurus sohal'') or sohal tang, is a species of marine

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 ...

Acanthuridae Acanthuridae are a family of ray-finned fish which includes surgeonfishes, tangs, and unicornfishes. The family includes about 86 extant species of marine fish living in tropical seas, usually around coral reefs. Many of the species are brigh ...

, which includes the surgeonfishes, unicornfishes and tangs. This fish is found in the northwestern Indian Ocean.

Taxonomy

The sohal surgeonfish was first formally described in 1775 as ''Chaetodon sohal'' by the Swedish-speaking Finnish

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 ...

explorer Exploration is the process of exploring, an activity which has some Expectation (epistemic), expectation of Discovery (observation), discovery. Organised exploration is largely a human activity, but exploratory activity is common to most organis ...

and orientalist

Peter Forsskål Peter Forsskål, sometimes spelled Pehr Forsskål, Peter Forskaol, Petrus Forskål or Pehr Forsskåhl (11 January 1732 – 11 July 1763) was a Sweden, Swedish exploration, explorer, oriental studies, orientalist, natural history, naturalist, and ...

with its type locality given as the

Red Sea The Red Sea is a sea inlet of the Indian Ocean, lying between Africa and Asia. Its connection to the ocean is in the south, through the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait and the Gulf of Aden. To its north lie the Sinai Peninsula, the Gulf of Aqaba, and th ...

. Forsskål proposed '' Acanthuirus'' as a

subgenus In biology, a subgenus ( subgenera) is a taxonomic rank directly below genus. In the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, a subgeneric name can be used independently or included in a species name, in parentheses, placed between the ge ...

of ''

Chaetodon ''Chaetodon'' is a tropical fish genus in the family (biology), family Chaetodontidae. Like their relatives, they are known as "butterflyfish". This genus is by far the largest among the Chaetodontidae, with about 90 living species included here, ...

'' although he recognised that it was probably different from ''Chaetodon'' even at the family level. In 1856 Desmarest designated ''Teuthis hepatus'', which had been described from a

type Type may refer to: Science and technology Computing * Typing, producing text via a keyboard, typewriter, etc. * Data type, collection of values used for computations. * File type * TYPE (DOS command), a command to display contents of a file. * ...

now known to have been collected at Ambon Island in the Moluccas (other erroneous type localities were named) in 1758 by Linnaeus, as the

type species In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...

of the genus. ''T. hepatus'' is a

synonym A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means precisely or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are a ...

of '' Paracanthurus hepatus'' and this would make ''Paracanthurus'' synonymous with ''Acanthurus''. An alternative would be to use the name ''Harpurus'' proposed as a

monospecific genus 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 "unispe ...

in 1788 by

Johann Reinhold Forster Johann Reinhold Forster (; 22 October 1729 – 9 December 1798) was a German Reformed pastor and naturalist. Born in Tczew, Dirschau, Pomeranian Voivodeship (1466–1772), Pomeranian Voivodeship, Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth (now Tczew, Po ...

when he described ''Harpurus fasciatus'', a synonym of ''Acanthurus triostegus''. It has been proposed that the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature should be petitioned to stabilise the genera ''Acanthurus'' and ''Paracanthurus''. In 2014 it was proposed that the type species of ''Acanthurus'' should be ''C. sohal'', which had also been described by Forsskål in 1775 as a member of the subgenus alongside '' C. bifasciatus'', '' C. nigrofuscus'' and '' C. unicornis'', and had been designated as the type species by

Jordan Jordan, officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, is a country in the Southern Levant region of West Asia. Jordan is bordered by Syria to the north, Iraq to the east, Saudi Arabia to the south, and Israel and the occupied Palestinian ter ...

and Evermann in 1917. The genus ''Acanthurus'' is one of two genera in the tribe

Acanthurini Acanthurini is a tribe of marine ray-finned fishes belonging to the family Acanthuridae and it is one of three tribes in the subfamily Acanthurinae. Taxonomy Acanthurini was first proposed as a taxon in 1839 by the French naturalist Charles Lucie ...

which is one of three tribes 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 ...

Acanthurinae ''Acanthurinae'' is a subfamily of marine ray-finned fishes belonging to the Family (biology), family Acanthuridae, found in the Indo-Pacific and the tropical Atlantic. These fishes commonly have the English names surgeonfishes or tangs. Taxono ...

which is one of two subfamilies in the family Acanthuridae.

Etymology

The sohal surgeonfish's

specific name Specific name may refer to: * in Database management systems, a system-assigned name that is unique within a particular database In taxonomy, either of these two meanings, each with its own set of rules: * Specific name (botany), the two-part (bino ...

, ''sohal'', is the Arabic name for this species along the Red Sea coast.

Description

The sohal surgeonfish has its

dorsal fin A dorsal fin is a fin on the back of most marine and freshwater vertebrates. Dorsal fins have evolved independently several times through convergent evolution adapting to marine environments, so the fins are not all homologous. They are found ...

supported by 9 spines and 30 or 31 soft rays while the anal fin is supported by 3 spines and 28 or 29, typically 29, soft rays. The depth of the body is around half the

standard length Fish measurement is the measuring of individual fish and various parts of fish anatomy, their anatomies, for data used in many areas of ichthyology, including Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy and fishery biology. Overall length Standard length (SL) is ...

. This fish has longitudinal, thin black stripes separated by greenish olive stripes and these join together at the spine on the

caudal peduncle Fins are moving appendages protruding from the body of fish that interact with water to generate thrust and help the fish swim. Apart from the tail or caudal fin, fish fins have no direct connection with the back bone and are supported only ...

. The stripes are finer and more sinuous on the upper body but broader and straighter on the lower body. The stripes are greyer on the upper head and nape. The lower head and ventral surface of the body are pale with faint grey and greenish grey longitudinal lines> the dorsal, anal and

pelvic fin Pelvic fins or ventral fins are paired fins located on the ventral (belly) surface of fish, and are the lower of the only two sets of paired fins (the other being the laterally positioned pectoral fins). The pelvic fins are homologous to the hi ...

s are black with vivid blue margins, there is a large patch of orange on the body underneath the

pectoral fin Fins are moving appendages protruding from the body of fish that interact with water to generate thrust and help the fish aquatic locomotion, swim. Apart from the tail or caudal fin, fish fins have no direct connection with the vertebral column ...

and the sheath of the spine on the caudal peduncle is orange. The

caudal fin Fins are moving appendages protruding from the body of fish that interact with water to generate thrust and help the fish swim. Apart from the tail or caudal fin, fish fins have no direct connection with the back bone and are supported only ...

lunate Lunate is a crescent or moon-shaped microlith. In the specialized terminology of lithic reduction, a lunate flake is a small, crescent-shaped lithic flake, flake removed from a stone tool during the process of pressure flaking. In the Natufian cu ...

. This species has a maximum published

total length Fish measurement is the measuring of individual fish and various parts of their anatomies, for data used in many areas of ichthyology, including taxonomy and fishery biology. Overall length Standard length (SL) is the length of a fish measured f ...

of .

Distribution and habitat

The sohal surgeonfish 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 the northwestern Indian Ocean where it is found in the

, east along the coast of the

Arabian Peninsula The Arabian Peninsula (, , or , , ) or Arabia, is a peninsula in West Asia, situated north-east of Africa on the Arabian plate. At , comparable in size to India, the Arabian Peninsula is the largest peninsula in the world. Geographically, the ...

to the

Persian Gulf The Persian Gulf, sometimes called the Arabian Gulf, is a Mediterranean seas, mediterranean sea in West Asia. The body of water is an extension of the Arabian Sea and the larger Indian Ocean located between Iran and the Arabian Peninsula.Un ...

. It has been found in the Mediterranean Sea, in 2017 and 2018, and reached there either by release from an aquarium or by

Lessepsian migration The Lessepsian migration (or Erythrean invasion) is the migration of marine species along the Suez Canal, usually from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean Sea, and more rarely in the opposite direction. When the canal was completed in 1869, fish, ...

through the

Suez Canal The Suez Canal (; , ') is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, Indo-Mediterranean, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez and dividing Africa and Asia (and by extension, the Sinai Peninsula from the rest ...

from the Red Sea. It is usually found on the outer edges of fringing reefs that are exposed to surge, typically down to depths of around .

Biology

The sohal surgeonfish may be encountered either singly or in small schools and is known to be very

territorial A territory is an area of land, sea, or space, belonging or connected to a particular country, person, or animal. In international politics, a territory is usually a geographic area which has not been granted the powers of self-government, ...

. The spine on the caudal peduncle has been reported to bear venom. It grazes on algae growing on hard substrates and despite being solitary they will school to graze in the territories of other fishes. The territory guards food resources and the territory holder may shelter and otherwise spend a lot of time out of its territory or patrolling its boundaries.

Utilisation

The sohal surgeonfish is targeted by fisheries as a food fish and is also traded in the

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, aquati ...

trade.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:surgeonfish, sohal

sohal surgeonfish The sohal surgeonfish (''Acanthurus sohal'') or sohal tang, is a species of marine ray-finned fish belonging to the family Acanthuridae, which includes the surgeonfishes, unicornfishes and tangs. This fish is found in the northwestern Indian Ocea ...

Fish of the Red Sea

Taxa named by Peter Forsskål