Bioe 127 Ichthyology Lecture Notes 2024 PDF

Bioe 127 Ichthyology Lecture 1 - Fish Diversity  Fish Diversity What is a fish? This is hard to define due to the immense diversity…  Fish Diversity What is a fish? This is hard to define due to the immense diversity… Very generally, we can think of a fish as an...

Bioe 127 Ichthyology Lecture 1 - Fish Diversity  Fish Diversity What is a fish? This is hard to define due to the immense diversity…  Fish Diversity What is a fish? This is hard to define due to the immense diversity… Very generally, we can think of a fish as an aquatic vertebrate with gills and whose limbs are shaped like fins when present.  Fish Diversity 77 spp. Several “primitive” fish groups make up a small % of extant species 42 spp. 51 spp. 1,331 spp. 96% of fishes fall into the infraclass ~31,000 spp. Teleostei 6 spp. 2 spp. 12 spp. Fishes are rendered 28 spp. paraphyletic by 7 spp. tetrapods 1 sp. 31,610 spp.  Fish Diversity Vertebrata ~64,000 Fishes 33,167 Tetrapods 31,005 Mammals 5,490 Birds 9,998 Reptiles 9,084 Amphibians 6,433  Fish Diversity Fishes 33,167 Freshwater species 41% Saltwater species 58% Diadromous 1% Temperature range -2 to +45°C  Fish Diversity Number of families 556 Seven largest families represent ~30% of fish diversity  Fish Diversity Cyprinidae (carps, goldfish) ~2,950 spp. Gobiidae (gobies) ~1,740 spp. Cichlidae (cichlids) ~1,670 spp. Characidae (piranha, pacus) ~1,065 spp. Loricariidae (armored catfishes) ~885 spp. Nemacheilidae (stone loaches) ~627 spp. Labridae (wrasses, parrotfishes) ~622 spp.  Describing & Illustrating Fishes Use counts and measurements to describe fishes Meristics: counts Morphometrics: measurements Draw the left side of the fish  Hubbs and Lagler (1958) Fishes of the Great Lakes Region - standardized description of fishes Describing Fishes Not all fishes are from the great lakes… Describing Fishes Fish Keys  Principal Component Analysis (PCA) - Data reduction technique - Collapses large data series into small number of factors  Principal Component Analysis (PCA) - Graphically display morphological differences - Characterize ecological body types  Principal Component Analysis (PCA) - Graphically display morphological differences - Characterize ecological body types  Principal Component Analysis (PCA) - Graphically display morphological differences - Can use Euclidean distance to estimate similarities  Phenogram - Classification of organisms based on overall similarity or other observable regardless of their overall evolutionary relationship - Lacks power to distinguish convergent evolution  Cladistics and Inferring Relatedness - Darwin was the first to understand evolution & common descent Charles Darwin - Hennig developed cladistic methods to infer relatedness Willi Hennig “father” of Cladistics A brief history of Ichthyology 2000 BC Ancient Egyptians Paintings and sculptures accurately depicted species of tilapia  Aristotle 384 – 322 BC - correctly separated cetaceans from fish A little too good… …people failed to - accurately described nesting behavior in expand on his work damselfishes for centuries Peter Artedi - The father of Ichthyology Swedish naturalist Established ichthyology as a scientific discipline Reportedly drown one night in a canal in Amsterdam (1705 - 1735)  Carl Von Linne (Linnaeus) 1st real attempt at classification of organisms Binomial nomenclature Obtained Artedi’s life work and published under his own name (1707 - 1778) Sebastes nebulosus Artedius & Linnaeus – BFF?  Artedius & Linnaeus – BFF? Here lies poor Artedi, in foreign land pyx'd Not a man nor a fish, but something betwixt, Not a man, for his life among fishes he past, Not a fish, for he perished by water at last.  Marcus Elieser Bloch (1723- 1799) - German medical Dr. & naturalist started describing fishes from travels published 12 volume comprehensive work on fishes  “He was ridiculed from the beginning of his professorship, being labeled an eccentric genius, a student of all the arts and a master of none. He missed classes, spent "too much time" with the University president's wife, wore rumpled clothes and had messy hair.” - Published Ichthyologia Ohiensis in 1820 Rafinesque (1783-1840) Audubon (1785-1851)  Charles Darwin 1809 - 1882 On the Origin of Species 1859 Species placed together in a genus were assumed to have a common origin underlies all important subsequent classifications of fishes  Darwin’s sheephead Semicossyphus darwini Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz (Louis Agassiz) - Swiss born, became Harvard professor - Described many Brazilian fishes - Creationist who denied Darwinism “I trust to outlive this madness.” … Nope! (1807 – 1873) 'Agassiz was great in the abstract but not in the concrete.’ David Starr Jordan George Albert Boulenger (1858-1937) - Belgian-British zoologist - described +1,000 fishes - Focused on region - Honorary 1st member of American Society of Ichthyologist Charles Tate Regan (1878 – 1943) Siamese fighting fish Anglerfish male parasitism Dr. Ethelwyn Trewavas 1900-1993 Ro Lowe-McConnell 1921-2014 Melanie Stiassny Curator: AMNH  Liz Alter Professor : CSUMB David Starr Jordan (1851-1931) - American Ichthyologist - Work is basis for present knowledge of North American fishes - Coined term of geminate species - Founding president of Stanford - Hopkins Marine Station - Murderer? - probably Carl and Laura Hubbs (1894 – 1979) (1893-1988) - Studied fishes of Great Lakes - Was a huge creeper - Moved to Scripps - still a creeper - standardized description of fishes J.L.B. Smith (1897-1968) - South African Ichthyologist - Discovered Coelacanth - Wrote Smith’s Sea Fishes  Jack Randall - American Ichthyologist - Spent his dissertation diving in French Polynesia and Hawaii - Described +730 spp. - most valid Nani in Opunohu The twilight zone