Cutlassfish Explained

The cutlassfishes are about 45 species of predatory fish in the family Trichiuridae of the order Scombriformes found in seas throughout the world. Fish of this family are long, slender, and generally steely blue or silver in colour, giving rise to their name. They have reduced or absent pelvic and caudal fins, giving them an eel-like appearance, and large fang-like teeth.^[1]

Some of the species are known as scabbardfishes or hairtails; others are called frostfishes because they appear in late autumn and early winter, around the time of the first frosts.

Classification

This list of species follows FishBase:

• Subfamily Aphanopidinae Gill, 1863
  • Genus Aphanopus
    • Aphanopus arigato Parin, 1994
    • Aphanopus beckeri Parin, 1994
    • Aphanopus capricornis Parin, 1994
    • Aphanopus carbo Lowe, 1839 (Black scabbardfish)
    • Aphanopus intermedius Parin, 1983 (Intermediate scabbardfish)
    • Aphanopus microphthalmus Norman, 1939 (Smalleye scabbardfish)
    • Aphanopus mikhailini Parin, 1983 (Mikhailin's scabbardfish)
  • Genus Benthodesmus Goode & Bean, 1882
    • Benthodesmus elongatus, Clarke, 1879 (Elongate frostfish)
    • Benthodesmus macrophthalmus, Parin & Becker, 1970 (Bigeye frostfish)
    • Benthodesmus neglectus, Parin, 1976 (Neglected frostfish)
    • Benthodesmus oligoradiatus, Parin & Becker, 1970 (Sparse-rayed frostfish)
    • Benthodesmus pacificus, Parin & Becker, 1970 (North Pacific frostfish)
    • Benthodesmus papua, Parin, 1978 (Papuan frostfish)
    • Benthodesmus simonyi, Steindachner, 1891 (Simony's frostfish)
    • Benthodesmus suluensis, Parin, 1976 (Philippine frostfish)
    • Benthodesmus tenuis, Günther, 1877 (Slender frostfish)
    • Benthodesmus tuckeri, Parin & Becker, 1970 (Tucker's frostfish)
    • Benthodesmus vityazi, Parin & Becker, 1970 (Vityaz' frostfish)
• Subfamily Lepidopodinae, Gill, 1863
  • Genus Assurger
    • Assurger anzac Alexander, 1917 (Razorback scabbardfish)
  • Genus Eupleurogrammus
    • Eupleurogrammus glossodon, (Bleeker, 1860) (Longtooth hairtail)
    • Eupleurogrammus muticus, (Gray, 1831) (Smallhead hairtail)
  • Genus Evoxymetopon
    • Evoxymetopon macrophthalmus Chakraborty, Yoshino & Iwatsuki, 2006^[2]
    • Evoxymetopon moricheni Fricke, Golani & Appelbaum-Golani, 2014^[3]
    • Evoxymetopon poeyi Günther, 1887 (Poey's scabbardfish)
    • Evoxymetopon taeniatus Gill, 1863 (Channel scabbardfish)
  • Genus Lepidopus
    • Lepidopus altifrons, Parin & Collette, 1993 (Crested scabbardfish)
    • Lepidopus calcar, Parin & Mikhailin, 1982 (Hawaiian ridge scabbardfish)
    • Lepidopus caudatus, (Euphrasen, 1788) (Silver scabbardfish)
    • Lepidopus dubius, Parin & Mikhailin, 1981 (Doubtful scabbardfish)
    • Lepidopus fitchi , Rosenblatt & Wilson, 1987 (Fitch's scabbardfish)
    • Lepidopus manis, Rosenblatt & Wilson, 1987 (Ghost scabbardfish)
• Subfamily Trichiurinae Rafinesque, 1810
  • Genus Demissolinea
    • Demissolinea novaeguineensis, Burhanuddin & Iwatsuki, 2003 (New Guinean hairtail)
  • Genus Lepturacanthus
    • Lepturacanthus pantului, (Gupta, 1966) (Coromandel hairtail)
    • Lepturacanthus roelandti (Bleeker, 1860)
    • Lepturacanthus savala, (Cuvier, 1829) (Savalani hairtail)
  • Genus Tentoriceps
    • Tentoriceps cristatus, (Klunzinger, 1884) (Crested hairtail)
  • Genus Trichiurus
    • Trichiurus auriga, Klunzinger, 1884 (Pearly hairtail)
    • Trichiurus australis Chakraborty, Burhanuddin & Iwatsuki, 2005^[4]
    • Trichiurus brevis, Wang & You, 1992 (Chinese short-tailed hairtail)
    • Trichiurus gangeticus, Gupta, 1966 (Ganges hairtail)
    • Trichiurus lepturus, Linnaeus, 1758 (Largehead hairtail)
    • Trichiurus margarites, Li, 1992
    • Trichiurus nanhaiensis, Wang & Xu, 1992
    • Trichiurus nickolensis, Burhanuddin & Iwatsuki, 2003 (Australian short-tailed hairtail)
    • Trichiurus russelli, Dutt & Thankam, 1966 (Short-tailed hairtail)

Timeline of genera

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Colors = #legends id:CAR value:claret id:ANK value:rgb(0.4,0.3,0.196) id:HER value:teal id:HAD value:green id:OMN value:blue id:black value:black id:white value:white id:cenozoic value:rgb(0.54,0.54,0.258) id:paleogene value:rgb(0.99,0.6,0.32) id:paleocene value:rgb(0.99,0.65,0.37) id:eocene value:rgb(0.99,0.71,0.42) id:oligocene value:rgb(0.99,0.75,0.48) id:neogene value:rgb(0.999999,0.9,0.1) id:miocene value:rgb(0.999999,0.999999,0) id:pliocene value:rgb(0.97,0.98,0.68) id:quaternary value:rgb(0.98,0.98,0.5) id:pleistocene value:rgb(0.999999,0.95,0.68) id:holocene value:rgb(0.999,0.95,0.88) BarData= bar:eratop bar:space bar:periodtop bar:space bar:NAM1 bar:NAM2

bar:space bar:period bar:space bar:era

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bar:eratop from: -65.5 till: -23.03 color:paleogene text:Paleogene from: -23.03 till: -2.588 color:neogene text:Neogene from: -2.588 till: 0 color:quaternary text:Q.

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color:paleocene bar:NAM1 from: -65.5 till: -28.4 text: Eutrichiurides color:eocene bar:NAM2 from: -48.6 till: 0 text: Lepidopus

PlotData= align:center textcolor:black fontsize:M mark:(line,black) width:25

bar:period from: -65.5 till: -55.8 color:paleocene text:Paleocene from: -55.8 till: -33.9 color:eocene text:Eocene from: -33.9 till: -23.03 color:oligocene text:Oligocene from: -23.03 till: -5.332 color:miocene text:Miocene from: -5.332 till: -2.588 color:pliocene text:Plio. from: -2.588 till: -0.0117 color:pleistocene text:Pleist. from: -0.0117 till: 0 color:holocene text:H.

bar:era from: -65.5 till: -23.03 color:paleogene text:Paleogene from: -23.03 till: -2.588 color:neogene text:Neogene from: -2.588 till: 0 color:quaternary text:Q.

References

• Sepkoski . Jack . A compendium of fossil marine animal genera . Bulletins of American Paleontology . 364 . 560 . 2002 . 2011-05-19 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20110723131237/http://strata.ummp.lsa.umich.edu/jack/showgenera.php?taxon=611&rank=class . 2011-07-23 .

External links

• Listing of Trichiuridae in English and Japanese 2003-10-27

Notes and References

1. Book: Paxton, J.R. . Eschmeyer, W.N.. Johnson, G.D. . Gill, A.C.. 1998. Encyclopedia of Fishes. Academic Press. San Diego. 190. 0-12-547665-5.
2. Ichthyological Research . 53 . 2 . 2006 . 137–142 . A new species of scabbardfish, Evoxymetopon macrophthalmus (Scombroidei: Trichiuridae), from Okinawa, Japan . Chakraborty, Yoshino & Iwatsuki . 10.1007/s10228-005-0319-x.
3. Fricke, R., Golani, D. & Appelbaum-Golani, B. (2014): Evoxymetopon moricheni, a new cutlassfish from the northern Red Sea (Teleostei: Trichiuridae). Ichthyological Research 61 (3): 293-297.
4. Ichthyological Research . 10.1007/s10228-005-0268-4 . 52 . 2 . 2005 . 165–170 . A new species, Trichiurus australis (Scombriformes: Trichiuridae), from Australia . Anirban Chakraborty . Andi Iqbal Burhanuddin . Yukio Iwatsuki .