Shortspine Thornyhead
Sebastolobus alascanus
Marine Life of the Northeast Pacific (MLNEP) notes 4
Thornyhead's have broad spiny heads, big prectoral fins, thinly tapering bodies, a small tail fin. Big eyes. Nearly always on the seafloor.
If the 3rd dorsal spine is much longer than the others, it's a Longspine. If not, it's a Shortspine. There is also a depth distribution, where Longspine are deeper, but there is also significant range overlap.
Since it's nearly impossible to consistently tell these two species apart in imagery, we'll treat them as Sebastolobus spp.
Summary 5
The shortspine thornyhead (Sebastolobus alascanus) is a species of fish in the Sebastidae family. It is sometimes referred to as the "idiot fish" or "idiot cod" due to its large oversize head/eyes. It is found in Canada, Russia, and the United States. Adult S. alascanus live predominantly in the oxygen minimum zone (OMZ), and thus require specific adaptations/exaptations in order to overcome the problems posed by the extremely low levels of oxygen saturation. Allowing for an.
Sources and Credits
- Southwest Fisheries Science Center, NOAA Fisheries Service, no known copyright restrictions (public domain), http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Sebastolobus_alascanus.jpeg
- (c) Jennifer Long, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Jennifer Long
- (c) ian_murdock, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by ian_murdock
- (c) Dr Cherisse Du Preez, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA)
- Adapted by Dr Cherisse Du Preez from a work by (c) Wikipedia, some rights reserved (CC BY-SA), http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sebastolobus_alascanus
