Australian Biological Resources Study

Australian Faunal Directory

Dactylopteridae, lateral view

Dactylopteridae, lateral view

Dactylopteridae, dorsal view

Dactylopteridae, dorsal view

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CAAB: 37308000

Family DACTYLOPTERIDAE

Flying Gurnards, Flying-gurnards, Helmet Gurnards


Compiler and date details

4 April 2015 - Dianne J. Bray, John R. Paxton, Jennifer E. Gates, Ursula E. Smith & Douglass F. Hoese

Introduction

Members of the Dactylopteridae, the flying gurnards, were reviewed by Eschmeyer (1997) who recognised two genera and six species from the Atlantic, Indian and western Pacific Oceans; Dactylopterus is restricted to the Atlantic Ocean. Five species in the genus Dactyloptena have been collected from Australian waters.

Flying gurnards are primarily benthic marine fishes in tropical and warm temperate waters, from shallow to moderate depths. They feed on benthic invertebrates such as crabs, worms and shellfish. They have an elongate, squarish body that tapers posteriorly, with the head well armoured by a shield of united bones with strong pre-opercular and post-temporal spines. The spinous dorsal fin is preceded by one or two free spines and the long pectoral fins are large, wing-like and horizontally inserted. Maximum length for the family is 32 cm.

Imamura (2000) concluded that the posterior extension of the dactylopterid infra-orbital is not homologous with the scorpaeniform suborbital stay and that this group is a perciform, closely related to, and in the same family as, the Malacanthidae. Recent molecular studies, however, suggest that the family belongs in the Syngnathiformes (Kawahara et al. 2008). Here we follow Paxton et al. (2006) and Eschmeyer & Fong (2014) in retaining the family in the Scorpaeniformes until relationships are further resolved.

 

History of changes

Note that this list may be incomplete for dates prior to September 2013.
Published As part of group Action Date Action Type Compiler(s)
06-May-2015 SCORPAENIFORMES 04-Apr-2015 MODIFIED Dr Dianne Bray (NMV) Dr Doug Hoese (AM) Dr Matthew Lockett (AM)
12-Feb-2010 (import)