Otolithes
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| Otolithes | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Tigertooth croaker (Otolithes ruber) | |
Scientific classification  | |
| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Actinopterygii |
| Order: | Acanthuriformes |
| Family: | Sciaenidae |
| Genus: | Otolithes Oken, 1817 |
| Type species | |
| Johnius ruber | |
| Species | |
|
see text | |
Otolithes is a small genus of marine ray-finned fishes belonging to the family Sciaenidae, the drums and croakers. The three recognised species in the genus are found in the Indo-West Pacific region.
Otolithes was first proposed as a genus in 1817 by the German naturalist Lorenz Oken. Its only species was Johnius ruber,[1] which had been described by Marcus Elieser Bloch and Johann Gottlob Theaenus Schneider in 1801 from the "Indian Ocean".[2] J. ruber was subsequently designated as the type species of the genus in 1861 by Theodore Gill.[1] Workers have recognised that there were more than two taxonomic units, or lineages, within Otolithes and that these may represent previously unrecognised cryptic species and in 2019 O. arabicus from the Persian Gulf was described as a third species in the genus, distinct from O. ruber and there may be a fourth, as yet undescribed, species in the western Indian Ocean which is found from South Africa to Gujarat.[3] This genus has been placed in the subfamily Otolithinae by some workers,[4] but the 5th edition of Fishes of the World does not recognise subfamilies within the Sciaenidae, which it places in the order Acanthuriformes.[5]
Etymology
Otolithes was proposed as the genus name in 1817 by Oken based on Georges Cuvier's les otolithes of 1816. Cuvier explained in 1830 that this was based on the peche-pierre, a name meaning "peach stone" which was used by French and Portuguese colonial settlers in Pondicherry and refers to the large otoliths of Johnius ruber.[6]
Species
Otolithes contains three described, recognised species:[7][2]
- Otolithes arabicus Y.-J. Lin, Qurban, K. N. Shen and Chao, 2019 (Arabian tigertooth croaker)
- Otolithes cuvieri Trewavas, 1974 (Lesser tigertooth croaker)
- Otolithes ruber (Bloch & Schneider, 1801) (Tigertooth croaker)