''Allocareproctus'' is a

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

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 ...

es 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 ...

Liparidae The snailfishes or sea snails (not to be confused with invertebrate sea snails), are a family of marine ray-finned fishes. These fishes make up the Liparidae, a family classified within the order Scorpaeniformes. Widely distributed from the ...

, the snailfishes. These fish are found in the northern

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...

Taxonomy

''Allocareproctus'' was first proposed as a monospecific genus in 1993 by the Russian

ichthyologist Ichthyology is the branch of zoology devoted to the study of fish, including bony fish (Osteichthyes), cartilaginous fish (Chondrichthyes), and jawless fish (Agnatha). According to FishBase, 35,800 species of fish had been described as of March 2 ...

Dmitry Leonidovich Pitruk Dmitry (); Church Slavic form: Dimitry or Dimitri (); ancient Russian forms: D'mitriy or Dmitr ( or ) is a male given name common in Orthodox Christian culture, the Russian version of Demetrios (, ). The meaning of the name is "devoted to, dedic ...

and

Vladimir Vladimirovich Fedorov Vladimir (, , pre-1918 orthography: ) is a masculine given name of Slavic origin, widespread throughout all Slavic nations in different forms and spellings. The earliest record of a person with the name is Vladimir of Bulgaria (). Etymology ...

with ''Careproctus jordani'' as its only species. ''C. jordani'' had been described in 1930 by Charles Victor Burke with its type locality in

Sagami Bay lies south of Kanagawa Prefecture in Honshu, central Japan, contained within the scope of the Miura Peninsula, in Kanagawa, to the east, the Izu Peninsula, in Shizuoka Prefecture, to the west, and the Shōnan coastline to the north, while the i ...

in Japan. In 2006 James Wilder Orr and Morgan Scott Busby reviewed the genus, described 4 new species from the

Aleutian Islands The Aleutian Islands ( ; ; , "land of the Aleuts"; possibly from the Chukchi language, Chukchi ''aliat'', or "island")—also called the Aleut Islands, Aleutic Islands, or, before Alaska Purchase, 1867, the Catherine Archipelago—are a chain ...

and confirmed the genus as a valid genus.

Etymology

''Allocareproctus'' is made up of ''Careproctus'', the original genus of ''A. jordani'', prefixed with ''allo'', which means "other", i.e. close to Careproctus.

Species

''Allocareproctus'' has 5 species currently classified within it: * '' Allocareproctus jordani'' (

Burke Burke (; ) is a Normans in Ireland, Norman-Irish surname, deriving from the ancient Anglo-Norman and Hiberno-Norman noble dynasty, the House of Burgh. In Ireland, the descendants of William de Burgh (''circa'' 1160–1206) had the surname'' de B ...

, 1930) (Cherry snailfish) * '' Allocareproctus kallaion''

J. W. Orr John William Orr (1815–1887) commonly known as J. W. Orr, was an Irish-born American wood engraver who drew many of his own illustrations and owned his own engraving and printing business. Biography He was born in Ireland on March 31, 1815, ...

Busby Busby may refer to: Clothing *Busby (military headdress), a kind of military headdress, made of fur, derived from that traditionally worn by Hussars. Places * Busby, Alberta, a hamlet in Canada *Busby, East Renfrewshire, a village in Scotland * ...

, 2006 (Combed snailfish) * '' Allocareproctus tanix'' J. W. Orr & Busby, 2006 (Peach snailfish) * '' Allocareproctus unangas'' J. W. Orr & Busby, 2006 (Goldeneye snailfish) * '' Allocareproctus ungak'' J. W. Orr & Busby, 2006 (Whiskered snailfish)

Characteristics

''Allocareproctus'' is characterized by the first 4 to 8 rays of the

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 ...

having their tips free of the fin membrane and they have

papillae Papilla (Latin, 'nipple') or papillae may refer to: In animals * Papilla (fish anatomy), in the mouth of fish * Papilla (worms), small bumps on the surface of certain worms * Basilar papilla, a sensory organ of lizards, amphibians and fish * De ...

associated with of the sensory system on the head. In the skull the symplectic bone extends to the central faces of the

quadrate bone The quadrate bone is a skull bone in most tetrapods, including amphibians, sauropsids ( reptiles, birds), and early synapsids. In most tetrapods, the quadrate bone connects to the quadratojugal and squamosal bones in the skull, and forms up ...

and the metapterygoid. The largest species is ''A. jordani'' which 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

''Allocareproctus'' snailfishes are only found in the northern Pacific Ocean from Japan to the Aleutian Islands. They are bathydemersal fishes found in deep water down to .

References

Liparidae Taxa named by Dmitry Leonidovich Pitruk Taxa named by Vladimir Vladimirovich Fedorov {{Liparidae-stub