''Sladenia gardineri'', the Indian round angler, is a species of marine ray-finned fish belonging to the family Lophiidae, the goose fishes, monkfishes or anglers. This species is found in the

Indo-Pacific The Indo-Pacific is a vast biogeographic region of Earth. In a narrow sense, sometimes known as the Indo-West Pacific or Indo-Pacific Asia, it comprises the tropical waters of the Indian Ocean, the western and central Pacific Ocean, and the ...

Taxonomy

''Sladenia gardineri'' was first formally described in 1908 by the English

ichthyologist Ichthyology is the branch of zoology devoted to the study of fish, including bony fish ( Osteichthyes), cartilaginous fish (Chondrichthyes), and jawless fish (Agnatha). According to FishBase, 33,400 species of fish had been described as of Octobe ...

Charles Tate Regan with its

type locality Type locality may refer to: * Type locality (biology) * Type locality (geology) See also * Local (disambiguation) * Locality (disambiguation) {{disambiguation ...

given as

Salomon Atoll The Salomon Islands or Salomon Atoll is a small atoll of the Chagos Archipelago, British Indian Ocean Territory. Description The atoll is located in the northeast of the Chagos Archipelago, between Blenheim Reef and Peros Banhos. The main isla ...

in the Chagos Archipelago of the Indian Ocean. When Regan described this species he classified it in a new genus '' Sladenia'' of which it was the only species, meaning that this species is the type species of ''Sladenia'' by monotypy. The genus ''Sladenia'' is one of 4 extant genera in the family Lophiidae which 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 in the monotypic

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 ...

Lophioidei within the order Lophiiformes.

Etymology

''Sladenia gardineri'' has the genus name ''Sladenia'' which honours

Percy Sladen Walter Percy Sladen (30 June 1849 – 11 June 1900) was an English biologist who specialised in starfish. The son of a wealthy leather merchant, Sladen was born near Halifax, Yorkshire on 30 June 1849. He was educated at Hipperholme Grammar Sc ...

, the British echinoderm biologist. The holotype of ''S. gardineri'' was collected during an expedition funded by his memorial trust. The

specific name Specific name may refer to: * in Database management systems, a system-assigned name that is unique within a particular database In taxonomy, either of these two meanings, each with its own set of rules: * Specific name (botany), the two-part (bino ...

''gardineri'' honours John Stanley Gardiner, the British zoologist who collected the holotype.

Description

''Sladenia gardineri'' was described by Regan as having the no third dorsal spine, which Regan called an occipital ray, on the head with this third spine being present in the other Lophiid genera. The head is large, its length being half the length of the fish. There are 9 soft rays in the dorsal fin and 6 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 colour is dark grey marked with pale sinuous lines, the outer half of the pectoral fin is pale. The length of the holotype was .

Distribution

''Sladenia gardineri'' is found in the Chagos Archipelago in the central Indian Ocean and has been recorded in the western Pacific Ocean off New South Wales, although these

specimen Specimen may refer to: Science and technology * Sample (material), a limited quantity of something which is intended to be similar to and represent a larger amount * Biological specimen or biospecimen, an organic specimen held by a biorepository ...

s may represent an undescribed species or '' S. remiger''. The holotype was collected at a depth of "450

fathom A fathom is a unit of length in the imperial and the U.S. customary systems equal to , used especially for measuring the depth of water. The fathom is neither an International Standard (SI) unit, nor an internationally-accepted non-SI unit. Hi ...

s".

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q21326407 gardineri Fish described in 1908 Taxa named by Charles Tate Regan