Striped snipe knife fish
| Striped snipe knife fish | ||||||||||||
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Striped snipe knifefish ( Aeoliscus strigatus ) |
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| Aeoliscus strigatus | ||||||||||||
| ( Günther , 1861) |
The striped snipe knife fish ( Aeoliscus strigatus ) is a small marine fish from the group of pipefish species . It occurs in the tropical western Pacific from southern Japan to eastern Australia ( New South Wales ) as well as in the Indian Ocean near the Seychelles and on the coast of Tanzania .
features
The striped snipe knifefish can reach a maximum length of 14 to 15 centimeters. Its body is elongated with a sharp edge on the abdomen. The head ends in a long, tubular mouth. The first dorsal fin sits at the end of the body. It is supported by three fin spines. As a member of the genus Aeoliscus , the striped snipe knife fish can bend the first dorsal fin spine with the help of a joint in the center of the spine. The second dorsal fin is supported by ten soft rays. Like the caudal fin, it is shifted towards the abdomen. The anal fin has twelve soft rays. The color of the striped snipe knifefish varies with the habitat. It is light over sandy and light gravel soils, with a black vertical stripe. Between sea grasses it takes on a green-yellow color.
It differs from the spotted snipe knife fish ( Aeoliscus punctulatus ) mainly in the absence of the small black dots that characterize the sister species.
Way of life
The striped snipe knife fish lives close to the ground mostly in dense, strictly synchronous schools, rarely in pairs or solitary. He stays at depths of one to 20 meters and swims in a vertical position, with his head down, and only adopts a “normal”, horizontal swimming position for a short time when fleeing. To protect them from predators, the fish stand between the long spines of diadem sea urchins or between branched hard corals . Snipe knifefish feed on small, planktonic crustaceans . Young fish live pelagic and, as soon as they have reached a length of around 20 millimeters, move on to the life of the adult animals close to the ground.
footnote
- ↑ αἰολίσκος referred to a small trombone in ancient Greek; for a long time the genus was called Amphisile , (Greek) "pointed on both sides"; (lat.) strigatus "striped"
literature
- Hans A. Baensch , Robert A. Patzner: Mergus Sea Water Atlas Volume 6. Non-Perciformes (non-perch-like). Mergus-Verlag, Melle 1998 ISBN 3-88244-116-X
- Rudie H. Kuiter : Seahorses, pipefish, shredded fish and their relatives . Verlag Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart 2001 ISBN 3-8001-3244-3
Web links
- Striped snipe knife fish on Fishbase.org (English)