Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Most species inhabit shallow, coastal waters, but a few are known from the open ocean, especially in association with sargassum mats. They are characterised by their elongated snouts, fused jaws, the absence of pelvic fins , and by thick plates of bony armour covering their bodies.
The group Pteropoda was established by Cuvier as "ptéropodes" in 1804. [4] François Péron and Charles Alexandre Lesueur thought the group to be larger, and so they also included the opisthobranch taxa (Phyllirhoë and Glaucus), the heteropoda taxa (Carinaria and Firola), and even the Ctenophora ().
Fishes are a paraphyletic group and for this reason, the class Pisces seen in older reference works is no longer used in formal taxonomy.Traditional classification divides fish into three extant classes (Agnatha, Chondrichthyes, and Osteichthyes), and with extinct forms sometimes classified within those groups, sometimes as their own classes: [1]
Catalog of Fishes is a comprehensive on-line database and reference work on the scientific names of fish species and genera. It is global in its scope and is hosted by the California Academy of Sciences. It has been compiled and is continuously updated by the curator emeritus of the CAS fish collection, William N. Eschmeyer.
The basic ranks are species and genus. When an organism is given a species name it is assigned to a genus, and the genus name is part of the species name. The species name is also called a binomial, that is, a two-term name. For example, the zoological name for the human species is Homo sapiens. This is usually italicized in print or underlined ...
All stickleback species show similar, unusual mating behaviour. Freshwater males develop a red colouration, and although this may be seen in oceanic and benthic species these tend to remain dull-coloured. The male then constructs a nest from weeds held together by spiggin, [5] a kidney secretion, then attract females to the nest.
The ocean represents the largest continuous planetary ecosystem, hosting an enormous variety of organisms, which include microscopic biota such as unicellular eukaryotes (protists). Despite their small size, protists play key roles in marine biogeochemical cycles and harbour tremendous evolutionary diversity.
FishBase is a global species database of fish species (specifically finfish). [1] It is the largest and most extensively accessed online database on adult finfish on the web. [2] Over time it has "evolved into a dynamic and versatile ecological tool" that is widely cited in scholarly publications. [3] [4] [5]