Gorgasia preclara Böhlke & Randall, 1981

Smith, David G., Bogorodsky, Sergey V. & Mal, Ahmad O., 2014, Records of the eels Kaupichthys atronasus (Chlopsidae), Phyllophichthus xenodontus (Ophichthidae), and Gorgasia preclara (Congridae) from the Red Sea, Cybium 38 (4), pp. 301-306 : 305

Gorgasia preclara Böhlke & Randall, 1981

( Fig. 4 )

Gorgasia preclara Böhlke & Randall, 1981: 44 , figs 2,

27, 29 ( Maldives and Philippines); holotype BPBM 21012. Okubo et al., 1984 (Ryukyu Is.). Myers and Donaldson, 1996: 212 ( Guam). Randall et al., 1997: 494 ( Indonesia and Coral Sea). Myers, 1999: 58 ( Palau). Castle and Randall, 1999: 45 (New Guinea). Allen and Erdmann, 2012: 115 ( Indonesia).

Material None

Description

A garden eel of the genus Gorgasia (flanges on upper lip not continuous around tip of snout) characterized by a distinctive and conspicuous colour pattern of pale bars on a brown background and a relatively low vertebral count (144- 152).

Distribution and habitat

Recorded from the Ryukyu Islands to the Coral Sea in the western Pacific, through the Philippines and Indonesia to the Maldive Islands and the Red Sea. Occurs on sand and rubble bottoms, generally in depths of less than 50 m. Garden eels live in burrows, with the posterior part of the body inserted in the substrate and the anterior part extended into the water column, where they feed on small organisms that drift by. When threatened, they retreat into their burrows .

Remarks

We record this species on the basis of a photograph ( Fig. 4 ) taken in Mashraba Bay, at Dahab, Egypt, on the east coast of the Sinai Peninsula. Later, in November of 2012, the eel was observed by the second author on a steep slope with patch of coarse sand at a depth of 14 m; an attempt at collection was unsuccessful. The distinctive colour pattern of white bars on a brown background is unmistakable; all of the other species of Gorgasia have a mottled colour pattern with at most some small pale spots. Only the anterior part of the body shows in our photograph; characteristically for garden eels, the posterior part is buried in the substrate. The pale bars are shorter than those of the holotype, in which they circle the body anteriorly. However, a specimen from the Maldives ( Castle and Randall, 1999: pl. 3G) has smaller, spotlike bars resembling those in our photograph. As pointed out by Castle and Randall (1999: 45), D’Ancona (1928: 47, pl. 3, figs. 6-8b) described a leptocephalus larva of Gorgasia from the Red Sea under the name Leptocephalus cotroneii , with 147-149 myomeres. This is within the range of G. preclara and could well represent the larva of that species. D’Ancona’s name predates Böhlke and Randall’s and would take precedence. Without a specimen in hand to confirm the characters, however, especially the number of vertebrae, we cannot verify the identification. For that reason we refrain from applying the larval name to this species.

Acknowledgements. – We thank Tilman J. Alpermann of the Senckenberg Research Institute and Natural History Museum Frankfurt (SF) for his collaboration in Red Sea fieldwork and loan of the specimen of Kaupichthys atronasus . The photograph in figure 1 was taken by S. Tränkner (SF), figure 2 by Sandra Raredon (USNM), and figure 4 by Christian von March (Red Sea Environ- ment Centre). Kenneth A. Tighe (USNM) contributed information on K. atronasus . This study was conducted as part of the scientific research cooperation between the Faculty of Marine Sciences (FMS), King Abdulaziz University (KAU), Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, and the Senckenberg Research Institute (SRI), Frankfurt, Germany, in the framework of the Red Sea Biodiversity Project. It was funded by KAU GRANT NO. “D/1/432-DSR”. The authors acknowledge, with gratitude KAU and SRI for technical and financial support.

Figures

Figure 4. - Gorgasia preclara, Mashraba Bay, Dahab, Egypt. Photo C. von March.