''Spicara maena'', the blotched picarel, is a

species A species () is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate sexes or mating types can produce fertile offspring, typically by sexual reproduction. It is the basic unit of Taxonomy (biology), ...

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 ...

native to the eastern

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second largest of the world's five borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions, with an area of about . It covers approximately 17% of Earth#Surface, Earth's surface and about 24% of its water surface area. During the ...

, the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern Eur ...

and the

Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal sea, marginal Mediterranean sea (oceanography), mediterranean sea lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bound ...

. The male grows to a maximum length of about , and the female reaches . This fish is fished commercially in some areas.

Taxonomy

''Spicara maena'' was first formally described as ''Sparus maena'' by

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné,#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. was a Swedish biologist and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming o ...

in the 10th edition of ''Systema Naturae'' published in 1758, with its type locality given as the Mediterranean. Genetic studies have confirmed that '' Spicara flexuosa'' is a separate species, not a

synonym A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means precisely or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are a ...

of ''S. maena'' The 5th edition of ''

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 ...

'' classifies the genus ''

Spicara ''Spicara'' is a genus of ray-finned fish belonging to the family Sparidae, which includes the seabreams and porgies. These fishes are found in the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. The species in the genus are known as picarels. Taxonomy ''Spicara' ...

''in the family Sparidae within the

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 ...

Spariformes Spariformes is an order of ray-finned fishes consisting of six families within the series Percomorpha. Taxonomy Spariformes was first used as a taxonomic term in 1860 by the Dutch physician, herpetologist and ichthyologist Pieter Bleeker. Trad ...

by the 5th edition of ''

''. Some authorities classify this genus in the subfamily Boopsinae, but the 5th edition of Fishes of the World does not recognise subfamilies within the Sparidae.

Etymology

''Spicara maena'' has the genus name ''Spicara'', which is a vernacular name for picarels, particularly ''S. flexuosa'' in Italy. This is presumed to derive from ''spica'', "a spike", or ''spicare'', meaning "in the form of or furnished with a spike", Rafinesque did not explain why he chose this name. 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 ...

, ''maena'', is a latinisation of ''maenis'' an

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

name for picarels, dating from at least the time of

Aristotle Aristotle (; 384–322 BC) was an Ancient Greek philosophy, Ancient Greek philosopher and polymath. His writings cover a broad range of subjects spanning the natural sciences, philosophy, linguistics, economics, politics, psychology, a ...

Description

''Spicara maena'' is a fairly deep-bodied fish, with males reaching a maximum length of about and females . The upper jaw is protrusible and the mouth contains several rows of small teeth. The single dorsal fin has eleven spines and twelve soft rays and the anal fin has three spines and nine or ten soft rays. There are sixty-eight to seventy scales on the

lateral line The lateral line, also called the lateral line organ (LLO), is a system of sensory organs found in fish, used to detect movement, vibration, and pressure gradients in the surrounding water. The sensory ability is achieved via modified epithelia ...

. This fish is blue-grey above with silvery sides and a scattering of small dark spots. There is usually one large dark blotch above the tip of the pectoral fin. ''Spicara maena'' is a rather variable species. It has many synonyms across its wide range and is often confused with the common picarel ''

Spicara smaris ''Spicara smaris'', one of the picarels, is a species of ray-finned fish belonging to the family Sparidae, the seabreams and porgies. This species is found in the eastern Atlantic Ocean, the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea. It grows to a maxi ...

''.

Distribution and habitat

''Spicara maena'' is found in the Eastern Atlantic, the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea. Its Atlantic range extends from Morocco and the Canary Islands northwards to Portugal. Its depth range is about . It lives near the seabed over sandy and muddy bottoms and in

seagrass Seagrasses are the only flowering plants which grow in marine (ocean), marine environments. There are about 60 species of fully marine seagrasses which belong to four Family (biology), families (Posidoniaceae, Zosteraceae, Hydrocharitaceae and ...

(''Posidonia oceanica'') meadows.

Biology

''Spicara maena'' is a gregarious fish that moves in schools and feeds on small benthic invertebrates and

zooplankton Zooplankton are the heterotrophic component of the planktonic community (the " zoo-" prefix comes from ), having to consume other organisms to thrive. Plankton are aquatic organisms that are unable to swim effectively against currents. Consequent ...

. It is a

protogynous hermaphrodite Sequential hermaphroditism (called dichogamy in botany) is one of the two types of hermaphroditism, the other type being simultaneous hermaphroditism. It occurs when the organism's sex changes at some point in its life. A sequential hermaphrodite ...

, starting life as a female and later changing into a male. In a study in the

Gulf of İzmir The Gulf of İzmir (), formerly known as the Gulf of Smyrna, is a gulf on the Aegean Sea, with its inlet between the Karaburun Peninsula and the mainland area of Foça. It is in length by in breadth, with an excellent anchorage. The city of İz ...

in the

Aegean Sea The Aegean Sea is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea between Europe and Asia. It is located between the Balkans and Anatolia, and covers an area of some . In the north, the Aegean is connected to the Marmara Sea, which in turn con ...

by Soykan and colleagues it was found that there are almost five times as many females as males and that the change of sex on average takes place within the length range and that all fish longer than are male. A study off the eastern central coast of the Adriatic Sea by Dulčić and colleagues found that the sex conversion on average happened between and that any fish longer than were male. The females become mature at the age of two years and spawning takes place between March and June in the Aegean, and between August and October further west in the Mediterranean. The male digs a hollow on the seabed and the female lays eggs with a sticky surface in this nest.

References

External links

* * * {{Taxonbar, from=Q2091291 maena Fish described in 1758 Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus