Taractes rubescens (Jordan & Evermann, 1887)

Ray, Dipanjan, Mohapatra, Anil & Mohanty, Swarup Ranjan, 2018, First report on occurrence of a rare fish, Keeltail Pomfret: Taractes rubescens (Jordan and Evermann, 1887) from Northern part of East coast of India, Records of the Zoological Survey of India 118 (2), pp. 194-194 : 194

Taractes rubescens ( Jordan and Evermann, 1887)

1887. Steinegeria rubescens Jordan and Evermann, Proc U. S. Nat. Mus., 9(586): 466-476.

Characters: Dorsal fin rays 30; Anal fin rays 21; Pectoral fin rays 20 and pelvic fin with I spine and 5 rays. Body ovate and compressed with pointed snout ( Figure 1 ). Dorsal profile of head straight and covered with scales; snout short; interorbital space flat with ridges and equals to eye diameter. Forehead slightly concave; mouth oblique, lower jaw projecting; maxilla broad and scaly, reaches vertically to the posterior border of eyes. Jaws with small bands of cardiform teeth arranged in 3-4 rows, palatine teeth in villiform bands but no teeth on vomer. Cheeks, opercle covered with scales; preopercle finely serrated. Body covered with cycloid scales; single, long base dorsal and anal fin anteriorly fulcate; pectoral fin very large reach up to middle of the anal fin; caudal fin lunate; auxillary scales present on the base of pectoral fin. Caudal peduncle with well developed groove and strong lateral keel. Gill rakers stout and widely interspaced, lower part with 9 developed gill rakers and 7 rudimentary and upper part with 2 developed and 5 rudimentary gill rakers. Lateral line inconspicuous; lower jaws with pores. The details of morphometry are given in Table 1 with a comparative account with the same species reported from different parts of the globe.

Colour: Body blackish brown, belly comparatively pale; posterior margin of caudal fin whitish, other fins dark.

Distribution: Pacific, Atlantic and Indian Ocean. Hawaii, Costa Rica, Peru, West Africa, Azores and Madeira Islands, Gulf of Mexico, Trinidad, Brazil, Oman, Gulf of Aden and Arabian Sea (Froses and Pauly, 2017; Jawad et al., 2014; Ali and McNoon, 2010; Carvalho-Filho et al., 2009) and Canary Island in Northern Atlantic Ocean ( Gonzalez-Lorenzo et al., 2013). From Indian waters this species was reported from Andaman and Nicobar Island ( Luther, 1966) and very recently reported from Cochin fishing harbour, Kerala ( Roul et al., 2017). Present paper first time reports this species from West Bengal, northern part of east coast of India.

Figures

Figure 1. Taractes rubescens (Jordan and Evermann, 1887).