''Idiosepius pygmaeus'', also known as the two-toned pygmy squid, Tropical Pygmy squid, is a species of
bobtail squid native to the
Indo-Pacific
The Indo-Pacific is a vast biogeographic region of Earth.
In a narrow sense, sometimes known as the Indo-West Pacific or Indo-Pacific Asia, it comprises the tropical waters of the Indian Ocean, the western and central Pacific Ocean, and the ...
. It occurs in waters of the
South China Sea
The South China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean. It is bounded in the north by the shores of South China (hence the name), in the west by the Indochinese Peninsula, in the east by the islands of Taiwan and northwestern Phil ...
,
Japan,
Philippines
The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no),
* bik, Republika kan Filipinas
* ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas
* cbk, República de Filipinas
* hil, Republ ...
,
Palau
Palau,, officially the Republic of Palau and historically ''Belau'', ''Palaos'' or ''Pelew'', is an island country and microstate in the western Pacific. The nation has approximately 340 islands and connects the western chain of the Ca ...
,
Indonesia
Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...
,
Northern Mariana Islands
The Northern Mariana Islands, officially the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI; ch, Sankattan Siha Na Islas Mariånas; cal, Commonwealth Téél Falúw kka Efáng llól Marianas), is an unincorporated territory and commonwe ...
, as well as northern and northeastern
Australia. It inhabits shallow, inshore waters.
[Reid, A. 2005. Family Idiosepiidae. ''In:'' P. Jereb & C.F.E. Roper, eds. ''Cephalopods of the world. An annotated and illustrated catalogue of species known to date. Volume 1. Chambered nautiluses and sepioids (Nautilidae, Sepiidae, Sepiolidae, Sepiadariidae, Idiosepiidae and Spirulidae)''. FAO Species Catalogue for Fishery Purposes. No. 4, Vol. 1. Rome, FAO. pp. 208–210.]
''I. pygmaeus'' weighs 0.00033 g upon hatching and increases in weight to 0.175 g as it reaches maturity in 50 days (1260 degree days). It inhabits waters at a temperature of 25.2 °C. Growth rate has been calculated as 12.55 and physiological growth rate as 0.498.
''I. pygmaeus'' grows to 20 mm in
mantle
A mantle is a piece of clothing, a type of cloak. Several other meanings are derived from that.
Mantle may refer to:
*Mantle (clothing), a cloak-like garment worn mainly by women as fashionable outerwear
**Mantle (vesture), an Eastern Orthodox ve ...
length.
This species has been reared on a diet of
glass shrimp (''
Acetes sibogae australis'') in the laboratory.
[Jackson, G.D. 1988. The Use of Statolith Microstructures to Analyze Life-history Events in the Small Tropical Cephalopod ''Idiosepius pygmaeus''. ''Fishery Bulletin'' (U.S.) 87: 265-272.]
The
type specimen
In biology, a type is a particular specimen (or in some cases a group of specimens) of an organism to which the scientific name of that organism is formally attached. In other words, a type is an example that serves to anchor or centralizes the ...
was collected in the
South China Sea
The South China Sea is a marginal sea of the Western Pacific Ocean. It is bounded in the north by the shores of South China (hence the name), in the west by the Indochinese Peninsula, in the east by the islands of Taiwan and northwestern Phil ...
() and is deposited at the
Zoologisk Museum of
Kobenhavns Universitet in
Copenhagen
Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...
.
[Current Classification of Recent Cephalopoda]
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References
Further reading
*Jackson, G.D. 1989. The use of statolith microstructures to analyze life-history events in the small tropical cephalopod ''Idiosepius pygmaeus''. ''Fishery Bulletin'' 87: 265-272.
*Jackson, G.D. 1992. Seasonal variation in reproductive investment in the tropical Loliginid squid ''Loligo chinensis'' and the small tropical Sepioid ''Idiosepius pygmaeus''. ''Fishery Bulletin'' 91: 260-270.
*Jackson, G.D. 1992. Seasonal abundance of the small tropical Sepioid ''Idiosepius pygmaeus'' (Cephalopoda: Idiosepiidae) at two localities off Townsville, north Queensland Australia. ''The Veliger'' 35(4): 396-401.
*Moynihan, M. 1983. Notes on the behavior of ''Idiosepius pygmaeus'' (Cephalopoda; Idiosepiidae). ''Behaviour'' 85: 42-57.
*Sasaki, M. 1923. On an adhering habit of a pygmy cuttlefish, ''Idiosepius pygmaeus'' Steenstrup. ''Annotationes Zoolodicae Japanenses'' 10(21): 209-213.
External links
Latitude and Longitude Data for ''Idiosepius pygmaeus''
GenBank Links for Genetic Information on ''Idiosepius pygmaeus''
*
Bobtail squid
Cephalopods described in 1881
{{sepiolida-stub