''Embiotoca jacksoni'', commonly known as the black surfperch, is a

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 ...

surfperch The surfperches are a family of perciform fishes, the Embiotocidae. They are mainly found in northeast Pacific Ocean (as far south as Baja California), but a few species (genera '' Ditrema'' and '' Neoditrema'') are found in the northwest Pacifi ...

es native to shallow coastal areas of the

Eastern Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the continen ...

. Other common names of the species include black perch and butterlips. They are usually a dark reddish brown to tan in color, often also with vertical dark bars across their body. They are commercially important

food Food is any substance consumed by an organism for nutritional support. Food is usually of plant, animal, or fungal origin, and contains essential nutrients, such as carbohydrates, fats, proteins, vitamins, or minerals. The substance is inge ...

and

game fish Game fish, sport fish or quarry refer to popular fish pursued by recreational anglers, and can be freshwater or saltwater fish. Game fish can be eaten after being caught, or released after capture. Some game fish are also targeted commerciall ...

Taxonomy

''Embiotoca jacksoni'' is one of two species classified under the genus ''

Embiotoca ''Embiotoca'' is a genus of surfperches native to the eastern Pacific Ocean. Species There are currently two recognized species in this genus: * '' Embiotoca jacksoni'' Agassiz, 1853 (Black surfperch) * ''Embiotoca lateralis ''Embiotoca lat ...

'', the other being the striped surfperch (''

Embiotoca lateralis ''Embiotoca lateralis'', commonly known as the striped surfperch or striped seaperch, is a species of surfperch The surfperches are a family of perciform fishes, the Embiotocidae. They are mainly found in northeast Pacific Ocean (as far south ...

''). They belong to the

family Embiotocidae. The species was first described by the Swiss-American biologist

Louis Agassiz Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz ( ; ) FRS (For) FRSE (May 28, 1807 – December 14, 1873) was a Swiss-born American biologist and geologist who is recognized as a scholar of Earth's natural history. Spending his early life in Switzerland, he rec ...

in 1853.

Description

The body of black surfperches is flattened laterally. They reach a maximum length of . Despite their common name, they are not black in color. They are usually a uniform dark reddish brown to tan in color, but they often also possess large darker colored vertical bars across their body (unlike striped surfperches which have horizontal orange and blue stripes). Rarely, they may exhibit a paler silvery to greenish-white body coloration with fainter bars, thus resembling barred surfperches ('' Amphistichus argenteus''). Black surfperches can still be distinguished, however, by the presence of a patch of enlarged scales between the pectoral and the pelvic fins. The thick lips are yellowish in color and may exhibit a darker "mustache" above the upper lip. The

tail The tail is the section at the rear end of certain kinds of animals’ bodies; in general, the term refers to a distinct, flexible appendage to the torso. It is the part of the body that corresponds roughly to the sacrum and coccyx in mammals, r ...

and

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 en ...

s are usually orange to reddish, occasionally possessing gold and dark blue stripes. They are believed to be capable of changing color for

camouflage Camouflage is the use of any combination of materials, coloration, or illumination for concealment, either by making animals or objects hard to see, or by disguising them as something else. Examples include the leopard's spotted coat, the ...

Biology and ecology

During mating season (summer), the males develop a pair of nipple-like organs extending from their

anal 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 se ...

s. Like all surfperches, they are

viviparous Among animals, viviparity is development of the embryo inside the body of the parent. This is opposed to oviparity which is a reproductive mode in which females lay developing eggs that complete their development and hatch externally from the m ...

(giving birth to live young). They reach sexual maturity after one or two years (at the length of ) and can live for up to nine years. They are

carnivore A carnivore , or meat-eater (Latin, ''caro'', genitive ''carnis'', meaning meat or "flesh" and ''vorare'' meaning "to devour"), is an animal or plant whose food and energy requirements derive from animal tissues (mainly muscle, fat and other sof ...

s, feeding primarily on small invertebrates during the day. Prey animals consist mostly of

gammarid Gammaridae is a family of amphipods. In North America they are included among the folk taxonomic category of " scuds", and otherwise gammarids is usually used as a common name. They have a wide distribution, centered on Eurasia, and are euryha ...

amphipod Amphipoda is an order of malacostracan crustaceans with no carapace and generally with laterally compressed bodies. Amphipods range in size from and are mostly detritivores or scavengers. There are more than 9,900 amphipod species so far descr ...

s and other crustaceans, but they also prey on worms,

bryozoa Bryozoa (also known as the Polyzoa, Ectoprocta or commonly as moss animals) are a phylum of simple, aquatic invertebrate animals, nearly all living in sedentary colonies. Typically about long, they have a special feeding structure called a l ...

ns, 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. Smaller black surfperches can behave as

cleaner fish Cleaner fish are fish that show a specialist feeding strategy by providing a service to other species, referred to as clients, by removing dead skin, ectoparasites, and infected tissue from the surface or gill chambers. This example of cleaning ...

, consuming

ectoparasite Parasitism is a close relationship between species, where one organism, the parasite, lives on or inside another organism, the host, causing it some harm, and is adapted structurally to this way of life. The entomologist E. O. Wilson has ...

s from each other and from other fish species.

Distribution and habitat

Black surfperches are native to the

. They can be found from shallow coastal waters from

Fort Bragg, California Fort Bragg, officially the City of Fort Bragg, is a city along the Pacific Coast of California along Shoreline Highway in Mendocino County. The city is west of Willits, at an elevation of . Its population was 6,983 at the 2020 census. Fort ...

Punta Abreojos () NGIA (2004) is a fishing town in Mulegé Municipality, Baja California Sur, Mexico. It is located at the entrance to , a Biosphere Reserve which is frequently visited by pods of grey whales. Rains (2006) An isolated hill, high, rises a few mi ...

Baja California Sur Baja California Sur (; 'South Lower California'), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Baja California Sur ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Baja California Sur), is the least populated state and the 31st admitted state of the 32 federal ent ...

, including off

Guadalupe Island Guadalupe Island ( es, Isla Guadalupe, link=no) is a volcanic island located off the western coast of Mexico's Baja California Peninsula and about southwest of the city of Ensenada in the state of Baja California, in the Pacific Ocean. The ...

. They are usually found as individuals or in small groups of three or four at depths of but can reach depths of . They inhabit rocky areas, eelgrass beds, and

kelp forest Kelp forests are underwater areas with a high density of kelp, which covers a large part of the world's coastlines. Smaller areas of anchored kelp are called kelp beds. They are recognized as one of the most productive and dynamic ecosystems on Ea ...

s, but can occasionally be found in sandy areas near human structures like piers or pilings.

Name

The specific name honours A.C Jackson who carried out a survey of port locations in

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

where he drew a sketch of a gravid female which he sent to Agassiz.

Importance

They are commercially important

and

. They are usually caught by baited hooks and

spearfishing Spearfishing is a method of fishing that involves impaling the fish with a straight pointed object such as a spear, gig or harpoon. It has been deployed in artisanal fishing throughout the world for millennia. Early civilisations were familia ...

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q142977 Black surfperch Taxa named by Louis Agassiz Fish described in 1853