Pomatoschistus marmoratus ( Risso, 1810 )

Kovačić, Marcelo, Renoult, Julien P., Pillon, Roberto, Svensen, Rudolf, Bogorodsky, Sergey V., Engin, Semih & Louisy, Patrick, 2022, Identification of Mediterranean marine gobies (Actinopterygii: Gobiidae) of the continental shelf from photographs of in situ individuals, Zootaxa 5144 (1), pp. 1-103 : 76-77

Pomatoschistus marmoratus ( Risso, 1810) ( Fig. 65 )—Marbled Goby

Atherina marmoratus Risso, 1810: 339 ; type locality: northwestern Mediterranean Sea , France, Nice .

Size. Maximum size 6.5 cm total length (Miller 1986).

Morphology. D V (V–VII) + I,8–10;A I,8–10; P 17–21 (Miller 1986). Moderately small goby with subcylindrical body, laterally compressed towards caudal fin, head slightly depressed and moderately large. Snout moderately large. Eyes dorsolateral, interorbital space moderately narrow. Caudal peduncle long and slender, clearly lower than body depth. Dorsal fins of similar height, the first dorsal fin may be slightly higher, with more or less rounded margin and no elongate spines. Caudal fin rounded. Scales present on body, sometimes visible on photographs, at least dorsally. Predorsal area naked (Miller 1986).

Live coloration. Background a pale sandy color, with a more or less marbled pattern of dark and white markings. On pale fine sand, light colors prevail, with almost no recognizable patterns ( Figs. 65a and 65b ). On coarser sediments, more contrasting patterns are usually displayed: 6 pale saddles on the back, 1 below first dorsal fin, 2 below second dorsal fin, 2 on caudal peduncle and one, narrower and sometimes faint, on nape above pectoral-fin base; variable number of faint rounded dark spots along midline, the last longitudinal and more obvious at caudalfin base ( Fig. 65c ). A preorbital dark bar, especially obvious in females, extends from each eye, through upper lip, to connect with that from the opposite side, forming a distinctive dark chin spot ( Fig. 65b ). Often a whitish to pale blue dot on nape, just behind eyes, generally more or less circled with an interrupted dark line, often like between brackets (such a marking may also appear in P. microps or Deltentosteus quadrimaculatus ). In males, cheeks often densely sprinkled with small black dots; first dorsal fin may be large, with brownish and pale stripes, and a blueblack spot on its rear upper corner ( Fig. 65a ).

Similar species. Pomatoschistus adriaticus , P. microps , P. minutus .

Habitat. Infralittoral species, often common on shallow soft bottoms (mostly fine to coarse sand) from 0.3–20 m depth ( Apostolou et al. 2011; Pillon et al. 2015; Patzner 2021), may occur to 60–70 m (Miller 1986).

Geographic distribution. Black Sea, Mediterranean and adjacentAtlantic Ocean.Widespread in the Mediterranean from Gibraltar to Levant, also common in the Black Sea (Miller 1986; Boltachev & Karpova 2017). Along the south Mediterranean coast between the Alboran Sea and Suez Canal in Egypt (Miller 1986) the species was confirmed from northern and southern Tunisia ( Mejri et al. 2009a). In the Atlantic Ocean, known from Gibraltar to south Portuguese coast (Miller 1986).

Figures

FIGURE 65. Live coloration in its natural habitat of Pomatoschistus marmoratus. A) Male and B) female, photos by R. Pillon, Rab Island, Croatia, northern Adriatic Sea. C) Female, photo by J. Renoult, Thau lagoon, Southern France.