Ronquils (sometimes spelt ronchils) is a small

family Family (from la, familia) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its ...

marine

ray-finned fish Actinopterygii (; ), members of which are known as ray-finned fishes, is a class of bony fish. They comprise over 50% of living vertebrate species. The ray-finned fishes are so called because their fins are webs of skin supported by bony or hor ...

, the Bathymasteridae. These fishes are found only in

Arctic The Arctic ( or ) is a polar regions of Earth, polar region located at the northernmost part of Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean, adjacent seas, and parts of Canada (Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut), Danish Realm (Greenla ...

and North Pacific waters. This family contains just seven

species In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...

in three

genera Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nomenclat ...

. The larger species are important to commercial

fisheries Fishery can mean either the enterprise of raising or harvesting fish and other aquatic life; or more commonly, the site where such enterprise takes place ( a.k.a. fishing ground). Commercial fisheries include wild fisheries and fish farms, both ...

as food fish. Ronquils are most closely related to the

eelpout The eelpouts are the ray-finned fish family Zoarcidae. As the common name suggests, they are somewhat eel-like in appearance. All of the roughly 300 species are marine and mostly bottom-dwelling, some at great depths. Eelpouts are predominantly ...

s and prowfish in the suborder Zoarcoidei of the order Scorpaeniformes.

Taxonomy

The Bathymasteridae was first proposed as a family in 1883 by the American ichthyologists David Starr Jordan and

Charles Henry Gilbert Charles Henry Gilbert (December 5, 1859 in Rockford, Illinois – April 20, 1928 in Palo Alto, California) was a pioneer ichthyologist and Fisheries science, fishery biologist of particular significance to natural history of the western Unit ...

. The 5th edition of ''

Fishes of the World ''Fishes of the World'' by the American ichthyologist Joseph S. Nelson (1937–2011) is a standard reference for fish systematics. Now in its fifth edition (2016), the work is a comprehensive overview of the diversity and classification of the ...

'' classifies this family within the

suborder Order ( la, ordo) is one of the eight major hierarchical taxonomic ranks in Linnaean taxonomy. It is classified between family and class. In biological classification, the order is a taxonomic rank used in the classification of organisms and ...

Zoarcoidei Zoarcoidei is a suborder of marine ray-finned fishes belonging to the order Scorpaeniformes. The suborder includes the wolffishes, gunnels and eelpouts. The suborder includes about 400 species. These fishes predominantly found in the boreal se ...

, within the order Scorpaeniformes. Other authorities classify this family in the infraorder Zoarcales wihin the suborder Cottoidei of the Perciformes because removing the Scorpaeniformes from the Perciformes renders that taxon non

monophyletic In cladistics for a group of organisms, monophyly is the condition of being a clade—that is, a group of taxa composed only of a common ancestor (or more precisely an ancestral population) and all of its lineal descendants. Monophyletic gro ...

. The monophyly of the Zoarcoidei has still not been fully ascertained but it is generally accepted that the most basal

is Bathymasteridae.

Etymology

The name ''ronquil'' is said to be an

anglicization Anglicisation is the process by which a place or person becomes influenced by Culture of England, English culture or Culture of the United Kingdom, British culture, or a process of cultural and/or linguistic change in which something non-English ...

from the Spanish ''ronco'', ''ronquillo'' being a

diminutive A diminutive is a root word that has been modified to convey a slighter degree of its root meaning, either to convey the smallness of the object or quality named, or to convey a sense of intimacy or endearment. A (abbreviated ) is a word-formati ...

, and which means “one who grunts”. The family name ''Bathymasteridae'' is derived from the type genus ''Bathymaster'' and this can be translated from the Greek to mean "deep searcher".

Genera

The ronquil family is divided into three genera as follows:

Characteristics

Ronquils have elongate with long dorsal and anal fins which are even in height along all of their length. These fins are separated from the large, truncate to round caudal fin by a clear caudal peduncle. There are between 43 and 49 branched and unbranched rays in the dorsal fin while the anal fin contains between 31 and 36 rays. These ray counts include between 1 and 6 weak, pliant to the front of the dorsal fin and 1 or 2 similar spines in the front of the anal fin. The pectoral fins are large and rounded while the pelvic fins are located on the thorax, and have a single spine and 5 soft rays. There is a single pair of nostrils. The scales vary from weakly ctenoid, nearly smooth, to strongly ctenoid. There are sensory pores on the upper head of head and on the cheeks and these are obvious. The lateral line is clearly visible and runs on the upper body, straight to the rear of the dorsal fin, and has between 75 and 105 scales. The roof of the mouth has palatine and vomerine teeth. The bill membrane is separate from the isthmus, in most cases. There is no swim bladder. These fishes may be olive brown to dull red, bluish black, or purplish in their overall colour, they can be marked with bright green, blue, yellow, red, orange, and white bars, spots or other markings. The colour and patterns often vary between populations or be an expression of

sexual dimorphism Sexual dimorphism is the condition where the sexes of the same animal and/or plant species exhibit different morphological characteristics, particularly characteristics not directly involved in reproduction. The condition occurs in most ani ...

. Ronquins vary in size from a total length of in '' Ronquilus jordani'' to more over for '' Bathymaster signatus''.

Distribution, habitat and behaviour

Ronqulis inhabit cold waters in the North Pacific where they have a wide range from

Baja California Baja California (; 'Lower California'), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Baja California ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Baja California), is a state in Mexico. It is the northernmost and westernmost of the 32 federal entities of Mex ...

to the

Sea of Japan The Sea of Japan is the marginal sea between the Japanese archipelago, Sakhalin, the Korean Peninsula, and the mainland of the Russian Far East. The Japanese archipelago separates the sea from the Pacific Ocean. Like the Mediterranean Sea, it h ...

, ronquils are

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, spending most of their time on or near the bottom. These fishes are typically found in shallow coastal waters down to depths of around , however, ''Bathymaster signatus'' has been taken from depths in excess of in the

Bering Sea The Bering Sea (, ; rus, Бе́рингово мо́ре, r=Béringovo móre) is a marginal sea of the Northern Pacific Ocean. It forms, along with the Bering Strait, the divide between the two largest landmasses on Earth: Eurasia and The Ameri ...

and

Aleutian Islands The Aleutian Islands (; ; ale, Unangam Tanangin,”Land of the Aleuts", possibly from Chukchi language, Chukchi ''aliat'', "island"), also called the Aleut Islands or Aleutic Islands and known before 1867 as the Catherine Archipelago, are a cha ...

. Ronquils feed primarily on small benthic

crustacean Crustaceans (Crustacea, ) form a large, diverse arthropod taxon which includes such animals as decapods, seed shrimp, branchiopods, fish lice, krill, remipedes, isopods, barnacles, copepods, amphipods and mantis shrimp. The crustacean group ...

s and

mollusk Mollusca is the second-largest phylum of invertebrate animals after the Arthropoda, the members of which are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 85,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized. The number of fossil species is e ...

s, and the stomachs of some specimens sampled contained only nudibranch]s. Little is known about predators of ronqulis but it is presumed that most larger carnivores that occur in the same areas as them, especially predatory fishes, will prey on them. Although considered fairly common, ronquils are rarely observed; this is likely owing to their secretive nature. Few specifics are recorded regarding ronquil spawning, but the males are known to guard the brood. The males have been known to cannibalize some of the eggs they are guarding.

References