''Ogcocephalus porrectus'', the rosy-lipped batfish, is endemic to
Cocos Island
Cocos Island ( es, Isla del Coco) is an island in the Pacific Ocean administered by Costa Rica, approximately southwest of the Costa Rican mainland. It constitutes the 11th of the 13 districts of Puntarenas Canton of the Province of Puntarenas ...
off the
Pacific coast
Pacific coast may be used to reference any coastline that borders the Pacific Ocean.
Geography Americas
Countries on the western side of the Americas have a Pacific coast as their western or southwestern border, except for Panama, where the Pac ...
of
Costa Rica
Costa Rica (, ; ; literally "Rich Coast"), officially the Republic of Costa Rica ( es, República de Costa Rica), is a country in the Central American region of North America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the no ...
. Though members of
Ogcocephalidae
Ogcocephalidae is a family of anglerfish specifically adapted for a benthic lifestyle of crawling about on the seafloor. Ogcocephalid anglerfish are sometimes referred to as batfishes,Western Atlantic
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
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 ...
. Rosy-lipped batfish generally reside in shallow to deep water benthic zones with a
bathymetric
Bathymetry (; ) is the study of underwater depth of ocean floors (''seabed topography''), lake floors, or river floors. In other words, bathymetry is the underwater equivalent to hypsometry or topography. The first recorded evidence of water de ...
range of 35 – 150 m. The syntypic series was collected at 120 m on a rocky bottom. What makes this fish distinctive are its rosy red lips, specialized
pectoral fins
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 ...
used for "walking", and an
illicium
''Illicium'' is a genus of flowering plants treated as part of the family Schisandraceae,
used for attracting prey.
Physical description
The most distinctive structure of ''Ogcocephalus porrectus'' is its
illicium
''Illicium'' is a genus of flowering plants treated as part of the family Schisandraceae,
, which is thought to be derived from its
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 conv ...
spine as it is in most
Lophiiformes
The anglerfish are fish of the teleost order Lophiiformes (). They are bony fish named for their characteristic mode of predation, in which a modified luminescent fin ray (the esca or illicium) acts as a lure for other fish. The luminescence c ...
.Bradbury, M.G. 1967. The genera of batfishes (Family Ogcocephalidae). Copeia, 2: 399-422. DOI: 10.2307/1442130 The anterior tip of the illicium bears a fleshy organ known as the esca, which appears as two bulbous lobes in ''O. porrectus''. ''Ogcocephalus porrectus'', along with other members of the
Ogcocephalidae
Ogcocephalidae is a family of anglerfish specifically adapted for a benthic lifestyle of crawling about on the seafloor. Ogcocephalid anglerfish are sometimes referred to as batfishes, ''O. porrectus'' does not possess the posterior dorsal spine, and the anterior spine is very short and housed within the
esca
The anglerfish are fish of the teleost order Lophiiformes (). They are bony fish named for their characteristic mode of predation, in which a modified luminescent fin ray (the esca or illicium) acts as a lure for other fish. The luminescence co ...
. The illicium and esca are contained within an illicial cavity covered in a scaleless skin.Bradbury, M.G. 1980. A revision of the fish genus Ogcocephalus with descriptions of new species from the Western Atlantic ocean (Ogcocephalidae:Lophiiformes). Proceedings of the California Academy of Sciences, 42 (7): 229-285. The illicial cavity is covered by an overhanging shelf-like triangular rostrum, which is made of modified scales and is equal in length to the width of the skull. When the illicium is retracted the scaleless skin folds in an accordion-like shape, which allows for the forward and downward movement of the esca upon protrusion.
Rosy-lipped batfish are dorsoventrally flattened, slightly concave anterior-laterally with a depressed head but well-elevated cranium in relation to the discoid body. The sides of the caudal region are slightly convex so that a cross-section of the region is triangular. They possess well-developed conical, stiff scales that overlap very little. They have three types of scales: a simple cone-shaped spine-tipped scale, known as a
tubercle
In anatomy, a tubercle (literally 'small tuber', Latin for 'lump') is any round nodule, small eminence, or warty outgrowth found on external or internal organs of a plant or an animal.
In plants
A tubercle is generally a wart-like projection ...
; a buckler, which is a multi-spined cone-shaped scale with the spines proceeding from the apex in a direct line down the scale; and a scale associated with the lateral line system. ''Ogcocephalus porrectus'' is covered mostly by bucklers, which afford it armor-like protection. The distinctive scale on the lateral line system has a hole in the cup-shaped bottom through which the spinal nerve reaches the neuromast and has prongs extending upwards allowing for sheaths of epidermis to cover and protect the neuromast. The lateral line system includes three series tracing the lips, cheeks, and eyes of the expanded head, and a series extending the length of the body beginning posterior to the eyes, down the dorsal disk to the base of the caudal fin.
The standard length of the lectotype is 147 mm, but this was the largest of the syntypes. The syntypes, as designated by Garman (1899), have an average standard length of 73.5 mm.
The mouth is terminal and minute, conical teeth are in bands on the jaws, palatines, and vomer. The gill openings are small and are found dorsally on the posterior region of the discoid body. The rosy-lipped batfish only has two and a half gills, with none appearing on the reduced first gill arch.
''Ogcocephalus porrectus'' has 2 or 3 dorsal fin rays and 14 pectoral fin rays.Hubbs, C.L. 1958. Ogcocephalus darwini, a new batfish endemic at the Galapagos Islands. Copeia 3: 161-170. DOI: 10.2307/1440581 The pectoral fins are angled horizontally and splayed out at the posterior end of the disk. They resemble and serve as a supporting appendage for “walking” more so than a fin for swimming. The pelvic fins are much reduced and found ventrally on the disk and anterior to the pectoral fins. The anal fin is small and elongate.
Preserved specimens are usually pale, but a pair of distinct dark blotches are found near the middle of the disk and are about as long as the snout. Though Garman (1899) described specimens as olivaceous dorsally and white ventrally, Hubbs (1958) and Bradbury (1980) report a vivid range of reddish colors on the dorsal side, including the fins and lips, hence their common name.
Food habits
The esca of ''O. porrectus'' is not thought to visually attract prey, but there is evidence that ''O. cubifrons'' excretes a chemical attractant from the esca to lure prey.Nagareda, B.H. and J.M. Shenker. 2008. Dietary analysis of batfishes (Lophiiformes: Ogcocephalidae) in the Gulf of Mexico. Gulf of Mexico Science 1: 28-35. Batfish species mainly consume small benthic invertebrates. Hubbs (1958) denoted small molluscs, snails and crabs, as the main diet of ''O. darwini''.
Other comments
Garman first described ''Ogcocephalus porrectus'' in 1899. His description was based upon four specimens designated as syntypes. In 1958, C.L. Hubbs designated the largest of the syntypes as the holotype, but this was revised in 1962 by Bradbury, who changed the designation to lectotype and thereby designating the others paralectotypes.
Derouen et al. (2015) concluded that Ogcocephalidae diverged within the Lophiiformes about 54 million years ago and originated in the disphotic zone at the area of transition between the continental shelf and slope. Based on fossil calibrated molecular phylogeny, they also determined the Eastern Pacific and Western Atlantic lineages of Ogcocephalus species are monophyletic and the sister taxon of Antennarioidei within the Lophiiformes.Derouen, V., W.B. Ludt, H. Ho, P. Chakrabarty. 2015. Examining evolutionary relationships and shifts in depth preferences in batfishes (Lophiiformes:Ogcocephalidae). Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 84: 27-33. DOI: 10.1016/j.ympev.2014.12.011
This species is not listed as threatened or endangered, although there is significant risk as
by-catch
Bycatch (or by-catch), in the fishing industry, is a fish or other marine species that is caught unintentionally while fishing for specific species or sizes of wildlife. Bycatch is either the wrong species, the wrong sex, or is undersized or juve ...