Common Name
Mexican Searobin
Year Described
Ginsburg, 1950
Identification
Dorsal Fin: X, 12
Anal Fin: 10
Pectoral Fin: 13-14
Body relatively stout but elongate and slightly compressed . Head is large, bony, and heavily sculptured with pronounced ridges and spines. Head relatively deep. Duck-billed snout is relatively short. Mouth is subterminal and small in size, containing bands of villiform teeth on the jaws, vomer, and palatines. Jaw is well short of eye. No spines at nostrils. Preopercle and opercle usually bear strong spines. Preopercular spine reaches well past opercle. Large, fan-like pectoral fins with strongly branched rays, with the lower three rays free, thickened, and separate from the fin membrane. Pectoral fin viewed from above squared off anteriorly, reaching a pointed tip, then a concave section, and finally rounded posteriorly. Pectorals when folded reach middle of anal fin base. Two dorsal fins: one spiny and one soft rays. Anal fin opposite soft dorsal fin. Caudal fin is truncate. Pelvic fin underneath pectoral fin on belly. Body covered in small ctenoid scales with the exception of the naked ventral surface. Nape scaled. Opercular membrane above spine partially scaled. Lateral line is continuous.
Color
Body gray to pale brown with red spots and blotches on dorsum and flanks. Spots darken to form several oblique bands (four in between the two dorsal fins). Spiny dorsal with a distinct ocellated black spot between spines 4-5. Both dorsal fins with reddish spots on the spines/rays and paler membranes. Pectoral fin reddish with a few pale whitish to yellowish crossbands over a dark to blackish median area of fin. Free pectoral rays red banded. Membrane between the first four rays plain reddish. Fin edged thinly with white. Anal and pelvic fins pale red to yellowish. Caudal fin with two red bands.
Size
Maximum size to 18cm SL.
Habitat
Soft bottoms from 9-274m (usually 27-146m).
Range
Known from the western Gulf of Mexico (Louisiana to the Bay of Campeche).
References
McEachran, J. D. & J. D. Fechhelm. 2005. Fishes of the Gulf of Mexico. Volume 2: Scorpaeniformes to Tetraodontiformes. University of Texas Press, Austin. i-viii +1-1004.
Richards, W. J. & G. C. Miller. 2003. Triglidae (pp. 1266-1277). In: Carpenter, K. E. (ed.) 2003. The living marine resources of the Western Central Atlantic. Volume 2: Bony fishes part 1 (Acipenseridae to Grammatidae). FAO species identification guide for fishery purposes and American Society of Ichthyologist and Herpetologists Special Publication No. 5. FAO, Rome. v. 2: i-vii + 602-1373.