Sailfin Clinid

Myxodes cristatus Valenciennes

Myxodes cristatus Valenciennes in Cuvier and Valenciennes, 1836:401 [coast of Chile; holotype and paratypes, MNHN A.2103].

DESCRIPTION.—Salient characters are listed in the key and Table 2. Dorsal fin XXXVI–XXXVIII (37.0),3–4 (3.7); total dorsal-fin elements 40–42; anal fin II,25–26 (25.8); pectoral fin 12; pelvic fin I, 3; caudal fin 11–12 (12); vertebrae 16–17 + 32 = 48–49 (3 specimens).

Myxodes cristatus ● Myxodes viridis ○

Myxodes cristatus ● Myxodes viridis ○

Morphometric characters of eight specimens examined: SL 70.0–123.0 mm; head length 20.8–22.5; head depth 14.3–15.6; head width 10.4–11.5; upper-jaw length 6.5–7.8; eye diameter 4.0–4.9; snout length 4.4–5.8; interorbital width 2.1–2.5; predorsal length 13.0–14.7; preanal length 39.4–44.6; caudal-peduncle length 6.3–8.3; caudal-peduncle depth 5.2–6.2; length first dorsal-fin spine 8.1–10.4; length fourth dorsal-fin spine 5.8–6.4; distance between dorsal-fin spines three and four 3.7–4.6; distance between dorsal-fin spines one and three 3.9–5.7; pectoral-fin length 13.5–18.9; pelvic fin length 9.0–11.4; length inner pelvic-fin ray 6.5–8.7; orbital-cirrus length 1.7–2.5; nasal-cirrus length 0.6–1.5.

SPECIES COMPARISON AND DISTRIBUTION.—See M. viridis.

SPECIMENS EXAMINED (those specimens indicated by an asterisk were lost in the mail subsequent to our examination of them).—Chile: MNHN A-2103 (holotype, 105 ± 15, and paratype, 148); La Ventana, USNM 205103 (1:81), SI0 65–678 (1:80); Vina del Mar, UCLA 66–58 (2:24–83); Gulf of Ancud, USNM 203557 (3:108–123);* Puerto Auchemo, USNM 176543 (1:71).*

Myxodes cristatus ● Myxodes viridis ○

Hubbs (1952) erected the tribe Labrisomini for the genera Labrisomus, Malacoctenus, Auchenionchus, Calliclinus, and Myersichthys. He erected the subtribe Labrisomidi for the first two of these genera and the subtribe Calliclinidi for the other three. He distinguished the subtribes by the presence of branched caudal-fin rays in the Calliclinidi and simple caudal-fin rays in the Labrisomidi. Interestingly, he erected a tribe, Cryptotremini, for two other genera (Cryptotrema, Alloclinus) of the subfamily Labrisominae with branched caudal-fin rays. He differentiated the tribe Cryptotremini from the tribe Labrisomini because the first three dorsal-fin spines of the Cryptotremini were soft and flexible, whereas those of the Labrisomini were supposedly sharp and rigid. However, the anterior dorsal-fin spines of one species of Labrisomini (Labrisomus filamentosus Springer, described after Hubbs’ study) are soft and flexible, and the spines of Cryptotrema corallinum Gilbert at best only questionably conform to Hubbs’ description. Thus, the characters used by Hubbs to define the Cryptotremini are distributed mosaically among Hubbs’ tribes Cryptotremini and Labrisomini.

We believe that the presence or absence of flexible anterior dorsal-fin spines is a character of little consequence for maintaining higher categories of clinids. We prefer to unite those clinids with branched caudal-fin rays into a single tribe, Cryptotremini, under which we synonymize the Calliclinini. In doing so we recognize that branched caudal-fin rays represent the unspecialized (plesiomorphic) condition in clinids. According to the tenets of Phylogenetic Systematics (Hennig, 1966) we are unjustified in recognizing relationships based on a plesiomorphic character. Our tribe Cryptotremini is based on similarity, and may well be reorganized when the phylogenetic paradigm is employed in an analysis of the Clinidae. We retain the tribe Labrisomini for Malacoctenus and Labrisomus, which genera have specialized caudal fins with unbranched rays (this character is, however, typical of all clinids except the Cryptotremini; for other characters separating the tribes of the subfamily Labrisominae see Hubbs, 1952, and Rosenblatt and Taylor, 1971).

It is of interest, if coincidental, that the geographic distribution of the Crytotremini, which we consider to be the least specialized tribe of the subfamily Labrisominae, is antitropical, just as is the distribution of the Myxodini, which we consider (Springer, 1970) to be the least specialized tribe of the other clinid subfamily, Clininae. None of the other clinid tribes is antitropical in distribution.

Myxodes cristatus, the sailfin clinid, is a species of clinid native to the Pacific coast of South America from central to southern Chile.