The stippled gunnel (''Rhodymenichthys dolichogaster'') is a

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of ...

of marine

ray-finned fish Actinopterygii (; ), members of which are known as ray-finned fishes, is a class of bony fish. They comprise over 50% of living vertebrate species. The ray-finned fishes are so called because their fins are webs of skin supported by bony or h ...

belonging to the

family Family (from la, familia) is a group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its members and of society. Idea ...

Pholidae ''Pholidae'' is a family of marine ray-finned fishes, known as gunnels, in the scorpaeniform suborder Zoarcoidei. These are fishes of the littoral zone and are mainly found in North Pacific Ocean, with two species found in the North Atlantic Oce ...

, the gunnels. It is the only species in the

monospecific 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 ...

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial n ...

''Rhodymenichthys''. It is found in the northern North Pacific Ocean.

Taxonomy

The stippled gunnel was first formally described as ''Blennius dolichogaster'' in 1814 by the German

zoologist Zoology ()The pronunciation of zoology as is usually regarded as nonstandard, though it is not uncommon. is the branch of biology that studies the animal kingdom, including the structure, embryology, evolution, classification, habits, and ...

and botanist

Peter Simon Pallas Peter Simon Pallas Fellow of the Royal Society, FRS FRSE (22 September 1741 – 8 September 1811) was a Prussian zoologist and botanist who worked in Russia between 1767 and 1810. Life and work Peter Simon Pallas was born in Berlin, the son ...

with its

type locality Type locality may refer to: * Type locality (biology) * Type locality (geology) See also * Local (disambiguation) * Locality (disambiguation) {{disambiguation ...

given as

Kamchatka The Kamchatka Peninsula (russian: полуостров Камчатка, Poluostrov Kamchatka, ) is a peninsula in the Russian Far East, with an area of about . The Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Okhotsk make up the peninsula's eastern and west ...

. In 1836 Achille Valenciennes described a new species ''Gunnellus ruberrimus'' from the

Kuril Islands The Kuril Islands or Kurile Islands (; rus, Кури́льские острова́, r=Kuril'skiye ostrova, p=kʊˈrʲilʲskʲɪjə ɐstrɐˈva; Japanese: or ) are a volcanic archipelago currently administered as part of Sakhalin Oblast in the ...

and in 1896 David Starr Jordan and

Barton Warren Evermann Barton Warren Evermann (October 24, 1853 – September 27, 1932) was an American ichthyologist. Early life and education Evermann was born in Monroe County, Iowa in 1853. His family moved to Indiana while he was still a child and it was ...

designated ''G. ruberrimus'' as the

type species In 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 species that contains the biological type specimen( ...

of the new

''Rhodymenichthys''. ''G. ruberrimus'' was later considered to be a junior synonym of Pallas's ''B. dolichogaster''. The 5th edition of ''

Fishes of the World ''Fishes of the World'' by the American Ichthyology, ichthyologist Joseph S. Nelson (1937–2011) is a standard reference for fish systematics. Now in its fifth edition (2016), the work is a comprehensive overview of the diversity and classificat ...

'' classifies this taxon within the subfamily Apodichthyinae, one of two subfamilies in the family Pholidae with the other being the monogeneric

Pholinae ''Pholis'' is a genus of marine ray-finned fish belonging to the family Pholidae, the gunnels. These fishes are found in shallow coastal waters of the North Pacific, Arctic and North Atlantic Oceans. Taxonomy ''Pholis'' was first proposed as ...

. Other authorities place this taxon outside of the Apodichthyinae and resolve ''Rhodymenichthys'' as a

sister taxon In phylogenetics, a sister group or sister taxon, also called an adelphotaxon, comprises the closest relative(s) of another given unit in an evolutionary tree. Definition The expression is most easily illustrated by a cladogram: Taxon A and ...

to the genus ''

Pholis ''Pholis'' is a genus of marine ray-finned fish belonging to the family Pholidae, the gunnels. These fishes are found in shallow coastal waters of the North Pacific, Arctic and North Atlantic Oceans. Taxonomy ''Pholis'' was first proposed as a g ...

'', so placing it within the Pholinae.

Etymology

The stipple gunnel's generic name ''Rhodymenichthys'' is a combination of ''

Rhodymenia ''Rhodymenia'' is a genus of red algae, containing the following species: *'' Rhodymenia acanthophora'' Greville *'' Rhodymenia adnata'' Okamura *'' Rhodymenia arborescens'' E. Y. Dawson *'' Rhodymenia ardissonei'' (Kuntze) Feldmann *'' Rhodyme ...

'', a genus of red

seaweed Seaweed, or macroalgae, refers to thousands of species of macroscopic, multicellular, marine algae. The term includes some types of ''Rhodophyta'' (red), ''Phaeophyta'' (brown) and ''Chlorophyta'' (green) macroalgae. Seaweed species such as ke ...

, assumed to be a reference to the cherry-red colour of the body and fins as well as the occurrence of this species in beds of that seaweed, with ''ichthys'' the

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

for "fish". The specific name ''dolichogaster'' means "long belly", assumed to refer to the

anal fin Fins are distinctive anatomical features composed of bony spines or rays protruding from the body of a fish. They are covered with skin and joined together either in a webbed fashion, as seen in most bony fish, or similar to a flipper, as s ...

's origin being quite far to the rear, creating a long belly.

Description

The stippled gunnel has an elongated body. Its

dorsal fin A dorsal fin is a fin located on the back of most marine and freshwater vertebrates within various taxa of the animal kingdom. Many species of animals possessing dorsal fins are not particularly closely related to each other, though through c ...

contains between 80 and 96 spines while the anal fin has 2 or 3 spines and between 40 and 51 soft rays. There is a single pore between the eyes and it has

pelvic fin Pelvic fins or ventral fins are paired fins located on the ventral surface of fish. The paired pelvic fins are homologous to the hindlimbs of tetrapods. Structure and function Structure In actinopterygians, the pelvic fin consists of two e ...

s. It has a highly variable body colour which may be brown, green or pale purple and there is a thin silvery horizontal band which runs from the eye to the base of the

pectoral fin Fins are distinctive anatomical features composed of bony spines or rays protruding from the body of a fish. They are covered with skin and joined together either in a webbed fashion, as seen in most bony fish, or similar to a flipper, as ...

. This species reached a maximum published

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

of .

Distribution and habitat

The stippled gunnel is found in the North Pacific Ocean from Niigata and

Iwate Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Tōhoku region of Honshu. It is the second-largest Japanese prefecture at , with a population of 1,210,534 (as of October 1, 2020). Iwate Prefecture borders Aomori Prefecture to the north, Akita Prefectu ...

s in Japan to Primorskii Krai,

Sakhalin Sakhalin ( rus, Сахали́н, r=Sakhalín, p=səxɐˈlʲin; ja, 樺太 ''Karafuto''; zh, c=, p=Kùyèdǎo, s=库页岛, t=庫頁島; Manchu: ᠰᠠᡥᠠᠯᡳᠶᠠᠨ, ''Sahaliyan''; Orok: Бугата на̄, ''Bugata nā''; Nivkh: ...

and the

Commander Islands The Commander Islands, Komandorski Islands, or Komandorskie Islands (russian: Командо́рские острова́, ''Komandorskiye ostrova'') are a series of treeless, sparsely populated Russian islands in the Bering Sea located about e ...

in Russia. It has been found from the

Bering Sea The Bering Sea (, ; rus, Бе́рингово мо́ре, r=Béringovo móre) is a marginal sea of the Northern Pacific Ocean. It forms, along with the Bering Strait, the divide between the two largest landmasses on Earth: Eurasia and The Amer ...

to the

Aleutian Islands The Aleutian Islands ( ; ; ale, Unangam Tanangin, "land of the Aleuts"; possibly from the Chukchi ''aliat'', or "island")—also called the Aleut Islands, Aleutic Islands, or, before 1867, the Catherine Archipelago—are a chain of 14 main, ...

and has been reported from South Korea, This species occurs down to and is commonly found among seaweeds in the

intertidal zone The intertidal zone, also known as the foreshore, is the area above water level at low tide and underwater at high tide (in other words, the area within the tidal range). This area can include several types of habitats with various species ...

References

{{Taxonbar, from1=Q1946827, from2=Q2412934 Apodichthyinae Fish described in 1814 Taxa named by Peter Simon Pallas