The daggertooth (''Anotopterus pharao'', meaning "without fins on its back, of the Pharaoh") is a species of

daggertooth The daggertooths (genus ''Anotopterus'') are a genus of marine mesopelagic fish in the order Aulopiformes, the sole genus of the family Anotopteridae. They are found in oceans worldwide, but prefer cooler waters. Description Daggertooths are not ...

. Its distribution includes the

North Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the "Old World" of Africa, Europe an ...

and west of

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

. The record size for this species is 96 cm and was

hermaphroditic In reproductive biology, a hermaphrodite () is an organism that has both kinds of reproductive organs and can produce both gametes associated with male and female sexes. Many taxonomic groups of animals (mostly invertebrates) do not have separ ...

. Daggertooths are occasionally found dead in bottom trawls used for

firefly squid The firefly squid (''Watasenia scintillans''), also commonly known as the sparkling enope squid or hotaru-ika in Japan, is a species of squid in the family Enoploteuthidae. It is the sole species in the monotypic genus ''Watasenia''. These tiny s ...

shrimp Shrimp are crustaceans (a form of shellfish) with elongated bodies and a primarily swimming mode of locomotion – most commonly Caridea and Dendrobranchiata of the decapod order, although some crustaceans outside of this order are refer ...

. They are similar to needlefish or

gar Gars are members of the family Lepisosteidae, which are the only surviving members of the Ginglymodi, an ancient holosteian group of ray-finned fish, which first appeared during the Triassic, over 240 million years ago. Gars comprise seven livin ...

s. However, they are distinct. Netted daggertooth specimens are rarely identifiable, mostly because of their soft bodies, which are easily torn or flattened. This is typical of

benthic The benthic zone is the ecological region at the lowest level of a body of water such as an ocean, lake, or stream, including the sediment surface and some sub-surface layers. The name comes from ancient Greek, βένθος (bénthos), meaning "t ...

animals of the deep ocean, like some transparent

squids True squid are molluscs with an elongated soft body, large eyes, eight arms, and two tentacles in the superorder Decapodiformes, though many other molluscs within the broader Neocoleoidea are also called squid despite not strictly fitting th ...

. In fact, the bodies are so soft, when pushed against the back of a trawl net, they often die because their organs are crushed and they rip. The habitat of the daggertooth is the open abyss, where few obstacles occur with which to come into physical contact.

References

''Anotopterus pharao''
at

Fishbase FishBase is a global species database of fish species (specifically finfish). It is the largest and most extensively accessed online database on adult finfish on the web.

''Anotopterus pharao''
at the Ichthyoplankton Information System {{Taxonbar, from=Q261110 Anotopteridae Taxa named by Erich Zugmayer Fish described in 1911