Author: Vaillant, 1888
Aldrovandia phalacra (Vaillant, 1888)
Status in World Register of Marine Species:
Accepted name: Aldrovandia phalacra (Vaillant, 1888) (updated 2009-06-25)
Diagnosis: preoral portion of snout short, contained about three times in total snout length. Dorsal finrays 10-12; ventral finrays I + 8; pectoral finrays I + 11-13. Top of snout and head scaleless, opercle scaleless. Pectoral fin reaches to level of ventral insertion. Pelvic fins lie well in advance of dorsal origin. Palatine tooth patches separate. Anterior gill arch with 19-23 rakers. Preanal lateral line scales 24-28; lateral line unpigmented. Pyloric caeca in a single row, black, 5-8. Colour: body light grey; head silvery blue laterally and dorsally, darker below and along edge of gill cover. Size: to 40-50 cm (gnathoproctal length to 18 cm).
Habitat: benthopelagic on the slope and rise (500-2,300 m), occurring primarily above the 4° C isotherm. Behaviour: hovers above substrate at an altitude of a few centimetres to a few metres. Food: small crustaceans (e.g. amphipods, copepods). Reproduction: sexually dimorphic: males with mature gonads have enlarged nostrils; the anterior nostril developed into a darkly pigmented tube. Females outnumber males 4 to 1 in western North Atlantic captures.
Distribution: known in the eastern Atlantic from the continental slope between 15° N and 45° N, as well as from the Azores. Elsewhere, in the western Atlantic from Cape Cod to the Bahamas and from the Rio Grande Rise off southern Brazil, from off South Africa, in the Indian Ocean and off the Hawaiian Is.
Eggs, larvae and young stages. Zugmayer, 1911-1912.
Otoliths (sagitta). No data.