Gobius bucchichi Steindachner, 1870

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 : 53

Gobius bucchichi Steindachner, 1870 ( Fig. 34 )—Bucchich’s Goby

Gobius bucchichi Steindachner, 1870: 627 , type locality: Adriatic Sea , Croatia, Hvar.

Size. Known adult size about 9 cm total length.

Morphology. D VI + I,14; A I,13–14; P 17–18. Medium-sized goby with moderately long body, and large head with short, slightly acute and oblique snout. Caudal peduncle deep, but lower than body depth. Dorsal fins of similar height, the first dorsal fin may be slightly taller, with more or less rounded margin and no elongate spines. Caudal fin rounded. Scales present on body and on predorsal area, usually visible on photographs, at least dorsally ( Kovačić & Šanda 2016).

Live coloration. Body pale gray, pale yellowish, or yellowish brown with pattern of brown dots forming longitudinal lines. Dots are most marked along the lateral midline but always remain separated and generally form a continuous row with no marked spaces ( Fig. 34 ). Eyes with a conspicuous horizontal dark brown stripe through the center, narrowly continuing on postorbital part of head as series of small close-set spots, an irregular longitudinal marking along the upper iris, a variable number of additional markings in orbit’s upper half but unmarked in ventral half, except sometimes with a small dot in its anterior portion. Snout with dark dashes forming M-shaped line. Usually it has only 2 longitudinal rows of dots on the cheek with a large unmarked area in the middle ( Fig. 33a ). Rarely, a few dots are visible also in the middle cheek but usually limited to the anterior part of the cheek, very close together, well aligned and not parallel to the lower row. Posterior angle of mouth without a well-defined dark dot ( Fig. 33a ), so the lower row of dots, which runs along the ventral edge of the cheek, starts with 2 dashes never preceded by a marked dot on the corner of the mouth ( Kovačić & Šanda 2016; Renoult et al. 2022).

Similar species. Gobius incognitus , G. fallax .

Habitat. Infralittoral species, known from 1–8 m depth from all kinds of rocky substrata: gravel, cobbles, boulders and bedrock, but on sand only when it is mixed with a hard substratum, never on pure sand. The substratum was bare or covered with short thallus algae ( Kovačić & Šanda 2016).

Geographic distribution. Presently known from the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea, it is common from the Gulf of Trieste ( Tiralongo & Pillon 2020) to southern Croatia ( Kovačić & Šanda 2016); there is only one record in the Ionian Sea from Butrint, southern Albania ( Kovačić & Šanda 2016), and a record in the Aegean Sea from Kondyli beach, eastern Peloponnese ( Tiralongo & Pillon 2020). Population from the Black Sea more similar in pattern of coloration to G. bucchichi than to G. incognitus in absence of black dot at the corner of mouth and any mark ventrally on iris ( Vasil’eva 2007; Boltachev & Karpova 2017), and requires additional study.

Figures

FIGURE 33. The mouth unmarked at corner in A) G. bucchichi and B) H. ingressus. Dark dot on the corner of the mouth in C) G. auratus, D) G. incognitus, E) G. xanthocephalus and F) G. fallax. Area marked with hollow circle. Photos by R. Svensen (A), S. Engin (B), M. Kovačić (C, D, F), and P. Louisy (E). C and F photographed in a tank.

FIGURE 34. Live coloration in its natural habitat of Gobius bucchichi. Photo by R. Pillon, Rab Island, Croatia, Northern Adriatic Sea.