| Louisiana pancake batfish | |
|---|---|
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Actinopterygii |
| Order: | Lophiiformes |
| Family: | Ogcocephalidae |
| Genus: | Halieutichthys |
| Species: | H. intermedius |
| Binomial name | |
| Halieutichthys intermedius Ho, Chakrabarty & Sparks, 2011 |
|
Louisiana pancake batfish, Halieutichthys intermedius, belongs to the Ogcocephalidae family of batfish. It is native to the Gulf of Mexico, and was discovered in 2010. Its entire range is covered by the effects of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
Originally thought to be a single species, these fish were determined in 2010 to be divided into three distinct species, the others being Halieutichthys aculeatus and Halieutichthys bispinosus.[1] While the other batfish are found along the Atlantic coast from Louisiana to North Carolina, the Louisiana pancake batfish is only found in the Gulf of Mexico in a range entirely covered by the effects of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.[1] They live at depths of up to 400 metres (1,300 ft).[2] Although numbers are not precisely known, in the initial trawl which led to their discovery around 100,000 fish were caught; only three were pancake batfish.[3]
Hsuan-Ching Ho, of the Academia Sinica in Taipei, Taiwan, discovered the Louisiana pancake batfish when he was visiting his colleague Prosanta Chakrabarty at the Louisiana State University. They noted that the specimens of the pancake batfish in the collection of the Baton Rouge Museum of Natural Sciences were actually three species, not a single one as previously thought. Trawling expeditions were conducted and consistent differences were identified in those found. They joined with John Sparks, of the American Museum of Natural History in New York to write the description that appeared in Journal of Fish Biology.[4]
Pancake batfish are so named from the flat shape of their bodies and from their motion on the sea bed, described as similar to a bat crawling.[1] They have pelvic fins which act like feet, complete with elbows to hop along the sea floor.[3][2] They feed on invertebrates, and uses chemical lures to catch prey.[1] They are small enough to fit in the palm of a human hand and described as being as thick as a "fluffy pancake".[5]
The Louisiana pancake batfish was named as one of the top ten new species of 2010 by the International Institute for Species Exploration at Arizona State University.[1] John Sparks, credited as one of the discoverers of the species, said "If we are still finding new species of fishes in the Gulf, imagine how much diversity, especially microdiversity, is out there that we do not know about".[1]