Percophidae

Percophis brasiliensis

The beak fish ( Percophidae ) ( Greek, perke = perch, ophis = snake; Syn: Bembropsidae ) live in the Atlantic Ocean, the Indian Ocean, the western and south-eastern Pacific. The fish live on the seabed, on the continental shelf at depths of 100 to 400 meters.

Features

Most species are wide-eyed, her head is flat, the body elongated and spindle-shaped. The eyes are close together at the top of the head and almost touch the lower jaw protrudes. They have separate hartstrahlige and weichstrahlige dorsal fins; in some species lack the hartstrahlige dorsal fin. The pelvic fins are throat constantly. Beak fish are three to 25 inches long.

System

There are nearly 50 species that are assigned to eleven genera and three subfamilies.

• Subfamily Percophinae ( 1 species )
• Subfamily Bembropinae (2 genera, 23 species )
• Subfamily Hemerocoetinae (8 genera, 24 species )

The Bembropinae be in the current revision of the teleost systematics by Betancur -R. and colleagues in the rank of a separate family brought within the Perciformes. Odani and employees give contrast to three autapomorphies for a relationship with the Bembropinae the Percophinae, but can for the monophyly of Percophidae (ie the inclusion of Hemerocoetinae ) call no autapomorphies.