''Chaunax suttkissi'', the pale-cavity gaper, spotted frogmouth, spotted gaper or Sutkus sea toad, 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 ...

Chaunacidae, the sea toads. This species is found in the Atlantic Ocean.

Taxonomy

''Chaunax suttkisi'' was first formally described in 1989 by the American

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 ...

John H. Caruso with its type locality given as off Venezuela in the

Caribbean Sea The Caribbean Sea is a sea of the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean in the tropics of the Western Hemisphere, located south of the Gulf of Mexico and southwest of the Sargasso Sea. It is bounded by the Greater Antilles to the north from Cuba ...

at 11°40'N, 62°33'W, at a depth of . Within the genus ''Chaunax'' this species is placed in the ''Chaunax fimbriatus''

species group In biology, a species complex is a group of closely related organisms that are so similar in appearance and other features that the boundaries between them are often unclear. The taxa in the complex may be able to hybridize readily with each oth ...

. The genus ''Chaunax'' is one of two genera classified by the 5th edition of the ''

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 t ...

'' within the family Chaunacidae, the sea toads. The sea toads are placed within the

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 ...

suborder Order () is one of the eight major hierarchical taxonomic ranks in Linnaean taxonomy. It is classified between family and class. In biological classification, the order is a taxonomic rank used in the classification of organisms and recognized ...

Chaunacoidei within the

anglerfish The anglerfish are ray-finned fish in the order Lophiiformes (). Both the order's common name, common and scientific name comes from the characteristic mode of predation, in which a modified dorsal Fish fin#Ray-fins, fin ray acts as a Aggressiv ...

order Order, ORDER or Orders may refer to: * A socio-political or established or existing order, e.g. World order, Ancien Regime, Pax Britannica * Categorization, the process in which ideas and objects are recognized, differentiated, and understood ...

Lophiiformes.

Etymology

''Chaunax'', the genus name, means "one who gapes", from ''chanos'' meaning "to gape", an allusion to the large, wide mouths of these fishes. The

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 ...

''suttkusi'', honours Royal D. Suttkus, an ichthyologist at

Tulane University The Tulane University of Louisiana (commonly referred to as Tulane University) is a private research university in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. Founded as the Medical College of Louisiana in 1834 by a cohort of medical doctors, it b ...

for his contributions to ichthyology and the extensive collection of fish specimens he collated during his career at the university.

Description

''Chaunax suttkusi'' has a globular, slight compressed body which tapers to a small, rounded

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 ...

. The large head is somewhat cuboid with small eyes which are covered in transparent skin. The large, oblique mouth is equipped with many small, thin, sharp vertical teeth and the

gill A gill () is a respiration organ, respiratory organ that many aquatic ecosystem, aquatic organisms use to extract dissolved oxygen from water and to excrete carbon dioxide. The gills of some species, such as hermit crabs, have adapted to allow r ...

opening is small. Of the three dorsal spines, two are embedded in the skin on the nape and only the first, the

illicium ''Illicium'' is a genus of flowering plants treated as part of the family Schisandraceae,

is visible. The illicium is tipped with a lure, or esca which is a mop-like tuft of filaments. The illicium is lowered into a flat, concave depression on the snout when not being used to attract prey. 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 ...

is on the rear of the body and contains between 10 and 12 soft rays while the

anal 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 o ...

has 6 or 7 soft rays. The loose, flabby skin has a dense covering of robust denticles. The lateral line is open and runs from the caudal peduncle to the head, with obvious canals connecting to branches under the eye, on the chin and along the lower flanks. The main part of the lateral line on the upper body contains between 29 and 42 pores with between 11 and 13 pores on the head. The overall colour is pale pink to rosy pink, with red on the top and sides of the head and fins and the undersides of both the head and body are whitish. The cavity on the snout for the illicium is pale while the illicium and esca are uniform in color, varying from pale through to dusky with the filaments of the esca being black. 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 and a maximum published weight of .

Distribution and habitat

''Chaunax suttkusi'' is found in the Atlantic Ocean. In the eastern Atlantic it occurs from Ireland south as far as Angola, its range includes the

Azores The Azores ( , , ; , ), officially the Autonomous Region of the Azores (), is one of the two autonomous regions of Portugal (along with Madeira). It is an archipelago composed of nine volcanic islands in the Macaronesia region of the North Atl ...

, while in the western Atlantic it can be found from

South Carolina South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...

as far south as the

Rio Grande Rise The Rio Grande Rise, also called the Rio Grande Elevation or Bromley Plateau, is an aseismic ocean ridge in the southern Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Brazil. Together with the Walvis Ridge off Africa, the Rio Grande Rise forms a V-shaped str ...

. It has also been found in the Mediterranean Sea. The range of this species is thought to be extending northwards due to increasing temperatures as a result of climate change.This is a

bathydemersal Demersal fish, also known as groundfish, live and feed on or near the bottom of ocean, seas or lakes (the demersal zone).Walrond Carl . "Coastal fish - Fish of the open sea floor"Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand. Updated 2 March 2009 T ...

species found at depths between on soft bottoms on the

continental shelf A continental shelf is a portion of a continent that is submerged under an area of relatively shallow water, known as a shelf sea. Much of these shelves were exposed by drops in sea level during glacial periods. The shelf surrounding an islan ...

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q2680277 sutkisi Fish of the Atlantic Ocean Taxa named by John H. Caruso Fish described in 1989