Hyporhamphus affinis

Hyporhamphus affinis, the tropical halfbeak, tropical garfish, insular halfbeak or coral reef halfbeak, is a species of schooling marine fish from the family Hemiramphidae. It is distributed through the Indo-Pacific regions and has been recorded in the Mediterranean Sea which it reached through the Suez Canal.

Hyporhamphus affinis
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Actinopterygii
Order: Beloniformes
Family: Hemiramphidae
Genus: Hyporhamphus
Species:
H. affinis
Binomial name
Hyporhamphus affinis
(Günther, 1866)
Synonyms[1]
  • Hemiramphus affinis Günther, 1866
  • Hemiramphus australensis Seale, 1906
  • Hemirhamphus delagoae Barnard, 1925
  • Hyporhamphus delagoae (Barnard, 1925)

Description

Hyporhamphus affinis has a blue back with a silvery stripe on side, silvery white underparts and a blue caudal fin while the other fins are colourless. They grow to a maximum length of 38 cm.[2] The distal half of the underside of the elongated lower jaw is bright red. There is a well developed anterior lobe on the dorsal fin and the caudal fin has a slightly longer lower lobe than the upper. The upper jaw is scaled, the pre-orbital region is much longer than the upper jaw.[3][4]

Distribution

Hyporhamphus affinis has an Indo-Pacific distribution from the Red Sea and coasts of eastern Africa east through the Indian Ocean islands to Western Australia, New Guinea, Philippines, and islands of Oceania, although it is absent from Hawaii and the Indo-Malayan Archipelago.[3] It has been recorded in the Mediterranean Sea since 1964.[5] and has been recorded as far west as Tunisia. It probably colonised the Mediterranean by Lessepsian migration through the Suez Canal from the Red Sea.[6]

Biology

Hyporhamphus affinis is found mainly at depths between 0 and 6m in proximity to coral reefs and islands but extends a little further from shore than Hyporhamphus dussumieri with which it is largely sympatric. It occurs in schools and feeds mainly on zooplankton, as well as small fish and detritus. The eggs are covered with adhesive filaments and are attached to floating and benthic objects.[3]

References
  1. "Synonyms of Hyporhamphus affinis (Günther, 1866)". Fishbase.org. Retrieved 11 February 2017.
  2. Cemal Turan; Deniz Ergüden; Mevlüt Gürlek; Çetin Keskin (2007). "Lessepsien Fishes of Turkey". In C. Turan (ed.). Atlas and Systematic of Marine Bony Fishes of Turkey. Nobel Publishing House. ISBN 978-9944-73-018-1.
  3. Pascualita Sa-a; Roxanne Rei Valdestamon (2016). R. Froese; D. Pauly (eds.). "Hyporhamphus affinis (Günther, 1866)". Fishbase.org. Retrieved 11 February 2017.
  4. "Hyporhamphus affinis". Encyclopedia of Life. Retrieved 11 February 2017.
  5. C.J. George; V.A. Athanassiou; I. Boulos (1964). "The fishes of the coastal waters of Lebanon". Miscellaneous papers in the Natural Sciences, The American University of Beirut. 4: 1–24.
  6. Ragnar Kinzelbach (2007). "First record of the Tropical Halfbeak Hyporhamphus affinis (Günther, 1866) in Tunesia (Teleostei: Hemirhamphidae)" (PDF). Rostocker Meeresbiologische Beiträge. 18: 82–83.
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