''Alloblennius frondiculus'' is a species of

combtooth blenny Combtooth blennies are blenniiformids; percomorph marine fish of the family Blenniidae, part of the order Blenniiformes. They are the largest family of blennies with around 401 known species in 58 genera. Combtooth blennies are found in tropic ...

(family Blenniidae) in the genus ''

Alloblennius ''Alloblennius'' is a genus of combtooth blennies (family Blenniidae) found in the western and northeastern Indian Ocean.

''.''Alloblennius frondiculus, a new species of blenny from the Andaman Islands (Teleostei: Blenniidae: Salariini)''
by William F. Smith-Vaniz and Gerald R. Allen, 2012.

Zootaxa ''Zootaxa'' is a peer-reviewed scientific mega journal for animal taxonomists. It is published by Magnolia Press (Auckland, New Zealand). The journal was established by Zhi-Qiang Zhang in 2001 and new issues are published multiple times a week. ...

Etymology

The species epithet "''frondiculus''" is treated as an appositional noun, and is

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

for "a small leaf", referring to the shape of the orbital

cirrus Cirrus may refer to: Science *Cirrus (biology), any of various thin, thread-like structures on the body of an animal *Cirrus (botany), a tendril *Infrared cirrus, in astronomy, filamentary structures seen in infrared light *Cirrus cloud, a type ...

Distribution

''A. frondiculus'' was described from a single female specimen,Holotype deposited at the Western Australian Museum, Perth, under number WAM P.33265-004 collected from the waters off the southwest shore of

South Cinque Island South Cinque Island or ''Ga-o-ta-koi''US Hydrographic Office (1916Bay of bengal Pilot page 288. H.O. pub. 160, Government Printing Office. is an uninhabited island of the Andaman Islands. It belongs to the South Andaman administrative district, ...

, one of the

Andaman Islands The Andaman Islands () are an archipelago in the northeastern Indian Ocean about southwest off the coasts of Myanmar's Ayeyarwady Region. Together with the Nicobar Islands to their south, the Andamans serve as a maritime boundary between th ...

in the

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by th ...

. It was discovered near a coastal shore at approximately 3 metres (10 feet) below

sea level Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical datuma standardised g ...

. ''A. frondiculus'' is the only member of the genus which is not found in the western Indian Ocean or the

Red Sea The Red Sea ( ar, البحر الأحمر - بحر القلزم, translit=Modern: al-Baḥr al-ʾAḥmar, Medieval: Baḥr al-Qulzum; or ; Coptic: ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϩⲁϩ ''Phiom Enhah'' or ⲫⲓⲟⲙ ⲛ̀ϣⲁⲣⲓ ''Phiom ǹšari''; T ...

Description

The holotypic female ''A. frondiculus'' specimen measured 23.8 mm in

standard length Fish measurement is the measuring of individual fish and various parts of their anatomies. These data are used in many areas of ichthyology, including taxonomy and fisheries biology. Overall length * Standard length (SL) is the length of a fish m ...

. Its body was olive in colour, becoming white around the stomach, and also bore six brown stripes on either side. It possessed yellow irises with reddish-orange lines stemming from the pupils. While most species of ''Alloblennius'' possess short, minute supraorbital cirri, the cirrus is large and prominent on ''A. frondiculus''.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q4732986 Fish described in 2012 frondiculus