Author: (Cocco, 1838)
Lobiancha gemellarii (Cocco, 1838)
Status in World Register of Marine Species:
Accepted name: Lobianchia gemellarii (Cocco, 1838) (updated 2009-06-25)
Diagnosis: dorsal finrays 17 (rarely 16 or 18); anal finrays 14 (rarely 13 or 15); pectoral finrays 12 (11, rarely 13). Gillrakers: (Atlantic: north of 40° N) 6 (rarely 5 or 7) + 1 + 14 (13, rarely 12 or 15), total 21 rarely 19 or 22); (Atlantic: 20°-40° N) 4 (5) + I + 10 (11, rarely total 15 (16-17, rarely 18); (Atlantic: 4°N-12°S) 5 + 1 + 11-12, total 17-18; (western South Atlantic) 4-5 + 1 + 11 (10-12), total 16-17 (15-18); (eastern South Atlantic) 4 (rarely 5) + 1 + 10 (11, rarely 12), total 15-16 (rarely 18). AO 5 (6, rarely 4) + 6 (7, rarely 5), total 11 (12, rarely 10). Males with supra-caudal gland only, consisting of about 6 luminous scales, flanked by triangular scales to form quincunx pattern. Females with infra-caudal gland only, consisting of 3-4 luminous scales, flan by triangular scales. Size: to 60 mm (breeding population) or greater than 100 mm (expatriates).
Habitat: high-oceanic, mesopelagic. Canaries: day at 300-500 m; nigh 25-100 m (juveniles) and 200-300 m (adults). Bermuda: day at 350 m (maximum abundance at 601-650 m); night at 51-350 m (maximum abundance at 101-150 m). Size stratification with depth both day and night (Bermuda). Food: no data. Reproduction: caudal glands develop males at about 37 mm and in females at 36 mm, but may be absent or partially formed in expatriates; sexually mature from about 43 mm. Spawning peak late autumn-winter (Bermuda).
Distribution: eastern Mediterranean basin; Atlantic: broadly tropical pattern (holo-eurytropical subpattern); expatriates mainly from 60° to 40° N, but isolated expatriates further to the south; breeding populalation between about 40° N and 39° S, but absent between 3° and 17° N east of 30° W and (?) seasonally absent in minimum region off Brazil. Elsewhere: Indian Ocean (between 2° N and 25° S east of 75° E), Pacific (western and eastern North and South Pacific between Japan and Australia between 30° N and 34° S respectively.
Eggs, larvae and young stages. Tåning, 1918: 73-76, fig. 27-28 | Sanzo, 1918: 9-16 | Tortonese, 1956: 945-947, fig. 816 | Pertseva-Ostroumova, 1964: 84-85, fig. 5 | Moser and Ahlström, 1974: 406, fig. 9 D | Cavaliere, 1976a, 177, pl. 14.
Otoliths (sagitta). Kotthaus, 1972a: 12, 26, fig. 65.