Marine Fishes of South-East Asia. Gerry Allen
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(Plate 69), razorfishes (Plates 78 and 79), and triggerfishes (Plates 100 and 101) are notorious in this respect. As a rule of thumb any fish with large, obvious teeth should be handled with care.
Stingers - virtually any fish which possesses rigid fin spines is capable of inflicting wounds if handled carelessly. Most are non-venomous and can be treated in the same manner as any puncture wound. Surgeonfishes (Plates 93 to 95) are equipped with scalpel-like spines that are either fixed in an erect position or fold into a groove along the base of the tail. Spearfishermen in particular, need to exercise special care when removing these fish from spears as large specimens can sever a finger. The most dangerous category of stingers includes fishes which have venomous spines. The best known of these are stingrays (Plates 4 and 5), catfish (Plate 11), scorpionfishes (Plates 18 to 20), and spinefeet (Plates 92 and 93). For all of these fishes the recommended first-aid procedure is to immerse the injured area in hot water (as hot as bearable), repeating until the pain subsides. Apparently the protein base of the toxin is denatured by heat and relief is sometimes immediate. In cases where the victim is stung by several spines, or if the wound is deep, medical assistance should be obtained. Firefishes, Lionfishes and stonefishes (Plates 18 and 19) have very potent venom in all fin spines. Several deaths have occurred as a result of people who failed to receive immediate first aid after treading on stonefishes.
Poisonous fishes - there are two main types of fishes in this category. The first includes species that have naturally occurring poisons either in their external mucus or in some internal organs, frequently the viscera or gonads. The best known examples are pufferfishes, porcupinefishes, and boxfishes (Plates 103 to 105). Although these fishes are eaten by the Japanese when specially prepared by licensed chefs, they are considered extremely dangerous and specimens from local waters should never be eaten. The symbol P is used in the species accounts to indicate fishes that are naturally poisonous. The second group of poisonous fishes includes species that acquire toxic properties during their life cycle by accumulating a dinoflagellate that lives on dead coral or among algae and is first consumed by herbivorous fishes which are eventually eaten by larger predatory fishes. The toxin known as ciguatera is accumulative and large fishes such as the Red Bass (Pl. 41-12) and Barracuda (Pl. 69-12) are potentially the most dangerous. The symptoms from eating ciguatoxic fish appear from one to 10 hours later and range from mild dizziness, diarrhoea, and a numb sensation of the lips, hands, and fingers, to extreme nausea, coma, and total respiratory failure. The degree of poisoning depends on the amount of fish that is consumed and the concentration of toxin it contains. As a matter of safe practice it would be wise to avoid eating large barracuda, Red Bass, or extraordinary large gropers, all of which have been implicated in ciguatera poisonings in other regions.
FISH VS. FISHES
Confusion is frequently expressed over the use of the words fish and fishes. The term “fish” in particular, is often used inappropriately. It is grammatically correct to use fish when referring to a single individual or more than one individual if only a single species is involved. For example, one might say “there were 100 fish in that school of Spanish Mackerel.” The term fishes is a plural form that is used when referring to two or more different species. For example, “we saw hundreds of fishes while diving on the reef’.
HOW TO USE
THIS BOOK
This book is designed as a pictorial guide that relies on visual comparison between the painted illustrations and actual specimens, photographs, or underwater observations. Distinguishing features are highlighted in the text accompanying each plate, in most cases referring to colour pattern or the shape of the body or fins. These features are useful for differentiating the species in question from its close relatives, or species it is likely to be confused with. A guide to families based on outline drawings precedes the species section. When attempting to place a fish in the proper family particular attention should be given to the head and body shape, number of dorsal fins, placement of fins and their positions relative to one another, and presence or absence of spiny elements in dorsal and anal fins in particular. The use of technical scientific words is deliberately avoided, but a few terms relating to the external features of fishes are useful for identification and are illustrated below.
Each species account appearing on the page opposite the corresponding plate includes the common name and scientific name followed by the name of the person who first described it and the date of description. If the person’s name appears in parentheses it indicates that the species was originally placed in a genus different from its presently recognised one.
Common names are invariably contentious in that species that range widely often have several common names according to locality. This problem is greatly compounded in South-east Asia because of the huge number of languages and dialects spoken. Because of this problem, it is unfortunately not possible to use local names. Therefore Australian common names are utilised. The basis for many of these is Munro’s Fishes of New Guinea, Marshall’s Fishes of the Great Barrier Reef Allen and Swainston’s Marine Fishes of North-Western Australia, and Randall, Allen, and Steene’s Fishes of the Great Barrier Reef and Coral Sea.
The text for each species contains general information on habitat, feeding habits, distinguishing features, and geographic distribution. Several of the distributional terms need to be explained in more detail. Indo-E. Pacific refers to a distribution that extends from East Africa to the Americas; E. Indian Ocean and W. Pacific is generally from the Maldives eastward to the western fringe of the Pacific, including Micronesia and Melanesia; W. and C. Pacific refers to the area encompassing the western fringe of the Pacific from Japan to Australia and extending eastward to embrace much of Oceania, often to Samoa, Tuamotus, or Society Islands south of the equator, and the Line Islands (and sometimes Hawaii) north of the equator; Indo-Australian Archipelago embraces the region including the Malay Peninsula, Indonesia, Philippines, northern Australia, and the islands of Melanesia.
The maximum known total length, measured from snout tip to the end of the tail is given at the end of each species account and for a few exceptionally large fishes the maximum recorded weight is also given. I have purposely omitted information on relative abundance (i.e., common, rare, etc.) as this parameter is subject to considerable local variation depending on availability of suitable habitat and in the case of migratory species, the time of year.
In addition to the individual species accounts, ‘boxes’ of text are included for most plates which contain general information for families, pertaining to such topics as number of species worldwide, ecology including food habits, and any noteworthy behavioural or morphological characteristics.
COLOUR PATTERNS
A major shortcoming of any field guide to fishes is that it is virtually impossible to illustrate all of the variations in colour that commonly occur within a single species. With a few exceptions the colours shown here are the “normal” or average ones displayed by live fish in their natural habitat. Anglers especially will be well aware that many fishes can drastically alter their coloration after being caught. Variation in colour pattern within individual species may also be related to age, sex, environmental conditions, or geography. Angelfishes (Plates 21-22), damselfishes (Plates 23-28), wrasses (Plates 28-32), and parrotfishes (Plates 33-34) are particularly notorious for dramatic changes in livery between the