The painted greenling (''Oxylebius pictus'') is a 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 ...

belonging to the

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 ...

Zaniolepididae, which includes this species and the combfishes. It is

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

to the northeast

Pacific Ocean 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 ...

. It is the only species in the genus ''Oxylebius''.

Taxonomy

The painted greenling was first formally described in 1862 by the American

biologist A biologist is a scientist who conducts research in biology. Biologists are interested in studying life on Earth, whether it is an individual Cell (biology), cell, a multicellular organism, or a Community (ecology), community of Biological inter ...

Theodore Gill Theodore Nicholas Gill (March 21, 1837 – September 25, 1914) was an American ichthyologist, mammalogist, malacologist and librarian. Career Born and educated in New York City under private tutors, Gill early showed interest in natural histor ...

with the type locality given as

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 ...

. Gill classified it in the

monospecific genus In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispec ...

''Oxylebius'' and proposed the

monotypic In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispec ...

subfamily In biological classification, a subfamily (Latin: ', plural ') is an auxiliary (intermediate) taxonomic rank, next below family but more inclusive than genus. Standard nomenclature rules end subfamily botanical names with "-oideae", and zoologi ...

Oxylebinae which was placed in the family

Hexagrammidae Hexagrammidae, the greenlings, is a family of marine ray-finned fishes belonging to the suborder Cottoidei in the order Scorpaeniformes. These fishes are found in the North Pacific Ocean. Taxonomy Hexagrammidae was first proposed as a family i ...

, although the subfamily was placed in the Zaniolepididae in the 6th 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 ...

'' and other authorities.

Etymology

The painted greenling's generic name ''Oxylebius'' prefixes ''oxy'' meaning "sharp", alluding to the sharper snout of this species in comparison to ''

Zaniolepis ''Zaniolepis'', the combfishes, is a genus of marine ray-finned fish, it is one of two genera in the family Zaniolepididae. These fishes are native to the eastern Pacific Ocean. ''Z. frenata'' that was a source of food to the Native American i ...

'', to ''lebius'' which Gill did not explain. However

jordan Jordan ( ar, الأردن; tr. ' ), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan,; tr. ' is a country in Western Asia. It is situated at the crossroads of Asia, Africa, and Europe, within the Levant region, on the East Bank of the Jordan Rive ...

and Evermann gave their view that ''lebius'' is a

Synonym A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are all ...

of ''

Hexagrammos ''Hexagrammos'' is a genus of marine ray-finned fishes belonging to the family Hexagrammidae, the greenlings. These fishes are found in the north Pacific Ocean. Taxonomy ''Hexagrammos'' was first proposed as a monospecific genus in 1810 by the ...

'' and is a

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

word for a fish small enough to be cooked in a kettle. The specific name, ''pictus'', means "painted" and is an allusion to the vertical banding of the body.

Description

The painted greenling has an elongated, compressed body and a long head with a pointed snout. There are 16 spines and between 14 and 16 soft rays in 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 ...

with 3 or 4 spines and 12 or 13 soft rays in the

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 ...

. The soft rayed part of the dorsal fin is higher than the spiny part. The

caudal 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 ...

is slightly rounded, there is an incision in the anal fin between the spines and the soft rays abd the

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 ...

is moderately long, not reaching the

anus The anus (Latin, 'ring' or 'circle') is an opening at the opposite end of an animal's digestive tract from the mouth. Its function is to control the expulsion of feces, the residual semi-solid waste that remains after food digestion, which, d ...

. The head is scaled and there is a single cirrus above each eye and a pair at the back of the head. The overall colour is grayish brown broken by between five and seven broad, clear red or reddish brown bars on the flanks and these reach onto the fins. In breeding males these bars are lost. A few fish are all dark marked with white spots. Three dark bars radiate out from the eyes, one towards the snout and two back towards the nape. There are dark spots on the throat and on the caudal, pectoral, and pelvic fins.

Distribution and habitat

The painted greenling is found in the eastern Pacific Ocean where it is found from

Kodiak Island Kodiak Island (Alutiiq: ''Qikertaq''), is a large island on the south coast of the U.S. state of Alaska, separated from the Alaska mainland by the Shelikof Strait. The largest island in the Kodiak Archipelago, Kodiak Island is the second larges ...

Alaska Alaska ( ; russian: Аляска, Alyaska; ale, Alax̂sxax̂; ; ems, Alas'kaaq; Yup'ik: ''Alaskaq''; tli, Anáaski) is a state located in the Western United States on the northwest extremity of North America. A semi-exclave of the U.S., ...

to central

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 ...

. Here it inhabits rocky areas shallower than .

Biology

Painted greenlings live in pairs or as solitary individuals. They guard their eggs and will even confront divers if they approach the cluster of orange eggs. Specimens (mainly juveniles) sometimes gain protection from larger predators by living among the tentacles of ''

Cribrinopsis albopunctata ''Cribrinopsis'' is a genus of cnidarians belonging to the family Actiniidae. The species of this genus are found in Eurasia, Northern America and New Zealand. Species: *''Cribrinopsis albopunctata'' *''Cribrinopsis crassa'' *''Cribrinopsis f ...

'' or ''

Urticina piscivora ''Urticina piscivora'', common names fish-eating anemone and fish-eating urticina, is a northeast Pacific species of sea anemone in the family Actiniidae. Description ''Urticina piscivora'' is a large anemone, growing to a maximum height of a ...

'' sea anemones, which are venomous to other animals but do not harm the painted greenling.Cowles, D. (2005).
Urticina piscivora (Sebens and Laakso, 1977).
'' Rosario Beach Marine Laboratory. Retrieved 29 January 2015. The painted greenling feeds on

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 ...

polychaetes Polychaeta () is a paraphyletic class of generally marine annelid worms, commonly called bristle worms or polychaetes (). Each body segment has a pair of fleshy protrusions called parapodia that bear many bristles, called chaetae, which are mad ...

, small

mollusc 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 esti ...

s and bryozoans.

References

External links

* {{Taxonbar, from=Q529202 painted greenling Western North American coastal fauna painted greenling