Find a Fish
Skull of a Barred Grunter
Pomadasys kaakan (Cuvier, 1830)
This fish skull was sent to the Australian Museum for identification by A. Jursevics. It was found on a beach near Townsville, Queensland.
None of the staff of the Fish Section could confidently say from which species of fish the skull originated. We emailed images of the skull to fish workers at the other major Australian natural history museums. Jeff Johnson of the Queensland Museum responded that the skull is from the Barred Grunter.
All the images are aligned with the head of the fish pointing to the left. A fish skull is comprised of many bones, with a varying degree of fusion between them. Sometimes a skull is found which is missing some bones. The skull in the images is missing the bones in front and below the eye socket, plus the jaws. The main bones are labelled in second image.
The lower image shows the Barred Grunter. It is recognised by its pattern of spots and blotches on the dorsal fin and the bands of double spots or blotches on the body. Large individuals may loose the body spots. It grows to 80cm in length.
The Barred Grunter is often found in estuaries where it feeds on prawns, crabs, molluscs and small fishes. In Australia it is recorded in tropical waters from Shark Bay, Western Australia to northern New South Wales.
Further reading
- Gregory, W.K., 1959. Fish Skulls. A study of the Evolution of Natural Mechanisms. Eric Lundberg, Florida. Pp. 481.
- McKay, R. J. 1984. Classification of the grunters and javelin-fishes of Australia. Australian Fisheries. October 1984. 43(10):37-40.
- Sasaki, K. 1989. Phylogeny of the Family Sciaenidae, with notes on its Zoogeography (Teleostei, Perciformes). Memoirs of the Faculty of Fisheries, Hokkaido University. 36(1/2): 1-137.
