Smalltooth Sawfish
The smalltooth sawfish (''Pristis pectinata'') is a species of sawfish in the family Pristidae. It is found in shallow tropical and subtropical waters in coastal and estuarine parts of the Atlantic. Reports from elsewhere are now believed to be misidentifications of other species of sawfish. It is a critically endangered species that has disappeared from much of its historical range. Distribution and habitat The smalltooth sawfish is found in tropical and subtropical parts of the Atlantic, including the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico. Its original range was the smallest of the sawfish species, covering about . In the west it once ranged from the United States to Uruguay and in the east from Senegal to Angola. Today it has disappeared from much of its historical range. There are old reports from the Mediterranean Sea, but this likely involved vagrants and according to the FAO the species can be considered extinct in the Mediterranean Sea. Smalltooth sawfish are mostly found in coas ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Aquarium Of The Americas
Audubon Aquarium of the Americas is an aquarium in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States. It is run by the Audubon Nature Institute, which also supervises Audubon Zoo, Audubon Louisiana Nature Center, Freeport-McMoRan Audubon Species Survival Center, Audubon Center for Research of Endangered Species (ACRES), Coastal Wildlife Network, Audubon Wilderness Park, and Audubon Park. It is located along the banks of the Mississippi River by the edge of the historic French Quarter off Canal Street, at the upper end of Woldenberg Park. It opened on September 1, 1990. Exhibits As its name implies, the aquarium specializes in aquatic life of the Americas. The exhibits feature regions throughout North and South America. With 10,000 animals representing 530 species, noteworthy exhibits include: * Caribbean reef exhibit featuring a clear, long tunnel surrounded by a tank of exemplary sea life such as the tarpon and angelfish; *Amazon exhibit, encased in a glass cylinder, effectively a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Brackish
Brackish water, sometimes termed brack water, is water occurring in a natural environment that has more salinity than freshwater, but not as much as seawater. It may result from mixing seawater (salt water) and fresh water together, as in estuaries, or it may occur in brackish fossil aquifers. The word comes from the Middle Dutch root '' brak''. Certain human activities can produce brackish water, in particular civil engineering projects such as dikes and the flooding of coastal marshland to produce brackish water pools for freshwater prawn farming. Brackish water is also the primary waste product of the salinity gradient power process. Because brackish water is hostile to the growth of most terrestrial plant species, without appropriate management it is damaging to the environment (see article on shrimp farms). Technically, brackish water contains between 0.5 and 30 grams of salt per litre—more often expressed as 0.5 to 30 parts per thousand (‰), which is a specific grav ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rostrum (anatomy)
Rostrum (from Latin ', meaning ''beak'') is a term used in anatomy for a number of phylogenetically unrelated structures in different groups of animals. Invertebrates * In crustaceans, the rostrum is the forward extension of the carapace in front of the eyes. It is generally a rigid structure, but can be connected by a hinged joint, as seen in Leptostraca. * Among insects, the rostrum is the name for the piercing mouthparts of the order Hemiptera as well as those of the snow scorpionflies, among many others. The long snout of weevils is also called a rostrum. * Gastropod molluscs have a rostrum or proboscis. * Cephalopod molluscs have hard beak-like mouthparts referred to as the rostrum. File:Washington DC Zoo - Macrobrachium rosenbergii 6.jpg, Crustacean: the rostrum of the shrimp ''Macrobrachium rosenbergii'' is serrated along both edges. File:Gminatus australis with Beetle.jpg, Insect: assassin bug piercing its prey with its rostrum File:Architeuthis beak.jpg, Cephalopod: ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Indo-Pacific
The Indo-Pacific is a vast biogeographic region of Earth. In a narrow sense, sometimes known as the Indo-West Pacific or Indo-Pacific Asia, it comprises the tropical waters of the Indian Ocean, the western and central Pacific Ocean, and the seas connecting the two in the general area of Indonesia. It does not include the temperate and polar regions of the Indian and Pacific oceans, nor the Tropical Eastern Pacific, along the Pacific coast of the Americas, which is also a distinct marine realm. The term is especially useful in marine biology, ichthyology, and similar fields, since many marine habitats are continuously connected from Madagascar to Japan and Oceania, and a number of species occur over that range, but are not found in the Atlantic Ocean. The region has an exceptionally high species richness, with the world's highest species richness being found in at its heart in the Coral Triangle, and a remarkable gradient of decreasing species richness radiating outward in al ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Green Sawfish
The longcomb sawfish, narrowsnout sawfish or green sawfish (''Pristis zijsron'') is a species of sawfish in the family Pristidae, found in tropical and subtropical waters of the Indo-West Pacific. It has declined drastically and is now considered a critically endangered species. Description The longcomb sawfish is possibly the largest species of sawfish, reaching a total length of up to , but rarely more than today. Its upperparts are greenish-brown to olive, while the underparts are whitish. A combination of characters are necessary to distinguish it from the other sawfish species: the longcomb sawfish has teeth to near the base of the rostrum or "saw" (unlike the knifetooth sawfish, ''Anoxypristis cuspidata''), 23–37 teeth on each side of the rostrum (18–24 in the dwarf sawfish, ''P. clavata'', 20–32 in smalltooth sawfish, ''P. pectinata'', and 14–24 in largetooth sawfish, ''P. pristis''), the teeth towards the tip of the rostrum are clearly closer to each other t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Dwarf Sawfish
The dwarf sawfish or Queensland sawfish, ''Pristis clavata'', is a sawfish of the family Pristidae, found in tropical Australia. This endangered species is the smallest species in its family. Description The dwarf sawfish has a torpedo-shaped body that resembles that of a shark, and grows to a length of about . It has broad, triangular pectoral fins and large, upright dorsal fins. The first dorsal fin is located directly above, or slightly behind, the origins of the pelvic fins, and the caudal fin has a very small lower lobe. The snout is broad and flat and is elongated into a rostrum with around twenty pairs of rostral teeth. This fish is usually greenish-brown, or occasionally yellowish-brown, on its dorsal surface, and whitish underneath. Distribution and habitat The dwarf sawfish is native to the western and central Indo-Pacific region and historically had a much wider range than it does now. Its present confirmed range is from the Cape York Peninsula, Queensland, to th ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pectoral Fin
Fins are distinctive anatomical features composed of bony spines or rays protruding from the body of a fish. They are covered with skin and joined together either in a webbed fashion, as seen in most bony fish, or similar to a flipper, as seen in sharks. Apart from the tail or caudal fin, fish fins have no direct connection with the spine and are supported only by muscles. Their principal function is to help the fish swim. Fins located in different places on the fish serve different purposes such as moving forward, turning, keeping an upright position or stopping. Most fish use fins when swimming, flying fish use pectoral fins for gliding, and frogfish use them for crawling. Fins can also be used for other purposes; male sharks and mosquitofish use a modified fin to deliver sperm, thresher sharks use their caudal fin to stun prey, reef stonefish have spines in their dorsal fins that inject venom, anglerfish use the first spine of their dorsal fin like a fishing rod ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pelvic Fin
Pelvic fins or ventral fins are paired fins located on the ventral surface of fish. The paired pelvic fins are homologous to the hindlimbs of tetrapods. Structure and function Structure In actinopterygians, the pelvic fin consists of two endochondrally-derived bony girdles attached to bony radials. Dermal fin rays (lepidotrichia) are positioned distally from the radials. There are three pairs of muscles each on the dorsal and ventral side of the pelvic fin girdle that abduct and adduct the fin from the body. Pelvic fin structures can be extremely specialized in actinopterygians. Gobiids and lumpsuckers modify their pelvic fins into a sucker disk that allow them to adhere to the substrate or climb structures, such as waterfalls. In priapiumfish, males have modified their pelvic structures into a spiny copulatory device that grasps the female during mating. File:Pelvic fin skeleton.png, Pelvic fin skeleton for ''Danio rerio'', zebrafish. File:Zuignap waarmee de zwartbekgrond ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Dorsal Fin
A dorsal fin is a fin located on the back of most marine and freshwater vertebrates within various taxa of the animal kingdom. Many species of animals possessing dorsal fins are not particularly closely related to each other, though through convergent evolution they have independently evolved external superficial fish-like body plans adapted to their marine environments, including most numerously fish, but also mammals such as cetaceans (whales, dolphins, and porpoises), and even extinct ancient marine reptiles such as various known species of ichthyosaurs. Most species have only one dorsal fin, but some have two or three. Wildlife biologists often use the distinctive nicks and wear patterns which develop on the dorsal fins of large cetaceans to identify individuals in the field. The bony or cartilaginous bones that support the base of the dorsal fin in fish are called ''pterygiophores''. Functions The main purpose of the dorsal fin is to stabilize the animal against rollin ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Largetooth Sawfish
The largetooth sawfish (''Pristis pristis'', syn. ''P. microdon'' and ''P. perotteti'') is a species of sawfish, family Pristidae. It is found worldwide in tropical and subtropical coastal regions, but also enters freshwater. It has declined drastically and is now critically endangered. A range of English names have been used for the species, or populations now part of the species, including common sawfish (despite it being far from common today), wide sawfish, freshwater sawfish, river sawfish (less frequently, other sawfish species also occur in freshwater and rivers), Leichhardt's sawfish (after explorer and naturalist Ludwig Leichhardt) and northern sawfish. Taxonomy The taxonomy of ''Pristis pristis'' in relations to ''P. microdon'' (claimed range: Indo-West Pacific) and ''P. perotteti'' (claimed range: Atlantic and East Pacific) has historically caused considerable confusion, but evidence published in 2013 revealed that the three are conspecific, as morphological and g ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Pristis Pectinata SI3
''Pristis'' is a genus of sawfish of the family Pristidae. These large fish are found worldwide in tropical and subtropical regions in coastal marine waters, estuaries, and freshwater lakes and rivers. Sawfish have declined drastically and all species are considered critically endangered today. Taxonomy The scientific genus name ''Pristis'' is derived from the Greek word for saw. Living species Recent authorities recognize four species: * ''Pristis clavata'' Garman, 1906 — dwarf sawfish, Queensland sawfish * ''Pristis pectinata'' Latham, 1794 — smalltooth sawfish * ''Pristis pristis'' (Linnaeus, 1758) — largetooth sawfish, common sawfish, freshwater sawfish, Leichhardt's sawfish * ''Pristis zijsron'' Bleeker, 1851 — longcomb sawfish, green sawfish These are divided into two species groups. Most are considered a part of the smalltooth group, except ''P. pristis'' which is the sole member of the largetooth group.Faria, V. V.; McDavitt, M. T.; Charvet, P.; Wiley, T. ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Seagrass
Seagrasses are the only flowering plants which grow in marine environments. There are about 60 species of fully marine seagrasses which belong to four families (Posidoniaceae, Zosteraceae, Hydrocharitaceae and Cymodoceaceae), all in the order Alismatales (in the clade of monocotyledons). Seagrasses evolved from terrestrial plants which recolonised the ocean 70 to 100 million years ago. The name ''seagrass'' stems from the many species with long and narrow leaves, which grow by rhizome extension and often spread across large "meadows" resembling grassland; many species superficially resemble terrestrial grasses of the family Poaceae. Like all autotrophic plants, seagrasses photosynthesize, in the submerged photic zone, and most occur in shallow and sheltered coastal waters anchored in sand or mud bottoms. Most species undergo submarine pollination and complete their life cycle underwater. While it was previously believed this pollination was carried out without pollinators ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |