The robust ghost pipefish (''Solenostomus cyanopterus''), also known as the blue-finned ghost pipefish, Racek's ghost pipefish, robust-snouted ghost pipefish or the squaretail ghost-pipefish, is a species of false pipefishes belonging to the family Solenostomidae.

Description

''Solenostomus cyanopterus'' can reach a length of and it is the largest of the ghost pipefishes. The body may be grey, brown, pink, yellow, or bright green, with small black and white dots. This cryptic species looks very similar to a drifting piece of seagrass. The caudal fin may be truncated, rounded, or lanceolated; the caudal peduncle is quite short or absent. The pelvic fin is sexually dimorphic. It is an uncommon species related to

pipefish Pipefishes or pipe-fishes (Syngnathinae) are a subfamily of small fishes, which, together with the seahorses and seadragons ('' Phycodurus'' and '' Phyllopteryx''), form the family Syngnathidae. Description Pipefish look like straight-bodied se ...

es and

seahorse A seahorse (also written ''sea-horse'' and ''sea horse'') is any of 46 species of small marine fish in the genus ''Hippocampus''. "Hippocampus" comes from the Ancient Greek (), itself from () meaning "horse" and () meaning "sea monster" or " ...

s. It can be distinguished by the presence of the

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, the prominent spiny

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 ...

, and 27–35 star-shaped plates on the skin.

Behavior

Solenostomidae - Solenostomus cyanopterus

These fish float near motionlessly, with their mouths facing downwards, around a background that makes them nearly impossible to see. They feed on tiny

crustacean Crustaceans (Crustacea, ) form a large, diverse arthropod taxon which includes such animals as decapods, seed shrimp, branchiopods, fish lice, krill, remipedes, isopods, barnacles, copepods, amphipods and mantis shrimp. The crustacean gro ...

s, sucked inside through their long snouts. They live in open waters except during breeding, when they find a coral reef or muddy bottom, changing color and shape to minimize visibility. Unlike true pipefish, female ghost pipefishes use their enlarged pelvic fins to brood their eggs until they hatch.

Distribution

This species lives in the

Red Sea The Red Sea ( ar, البحر الأحمر - بحر القلزم, translit=Modern: al-Baḥr al-ʾAḥmar, Medieval: Baḥr al-Qulzum; or ; Coptic: ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϩⲁϩ ''Phiom Enhah'' or ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϣⲁⲣⲓ ''Phiom ǹšari''; ...

and in the tropical

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 ...

, from the coast of East Africa to Fiji, southern Japan and Australia.

Habitat

The robust ghost pipefish is mostly

pelagic The pelagic zone consists of the water column of the open ocean, and can be further divided into regions by depth (as illustrated on the right). The word ''pelagic'' is derived . The pelagic zone can be thought of as an imaginary cylinder or w ...

and reef-associated. When it settles on the substrate for breeding, it can be found on coastal reefs and weedy areas, at a depth of .

References

External links

ITIS

Australian Museum
*

Tim Flannery Timothy Fridtjof Flannery (born 28 January 1956) is an Australian mammalogist, palaeontologist, environmentalist, conservationist, explorer, author, science communicator, activist and public scientist. He was awarded Australian of the Ye ...

and Peter Schouten. ''Amazing Animals: Extraordinary Creatures and the Fantastic Worlds They Inhabit''. New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 2004. Page 116-117. *Orr, JW and Fritzsche, RA. 1993. Revision of the Ghost Pipefishes, Family Solenostomidae (Teleostei: Syngnathoidei). Copeia 1993:168–182.
Fishes of Australia : ''Solenostomus halimeda''
* {{Taxonbar, from=Q1623559 Solenostomus Fish described in 1854 Taxa named by Pieter Bleeker