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Spangled Tubeshoulder
Persparsia kopua (Phillipps, 1942)
A Spangled Tubeshoulder trawled during the NORFANZ expedition at a depth between the surface and 1202 m in international waters south of Norfolk Island, June 2003 (NMNZ P.39532). Photo: K. Parkinson © NORFANZ. View larger image.
The Spangled Tubeshoulder has an elongate, compressed body. It has short snout, large eyes and single rows of fine needle-like teeth in both jaws. The body is covered with small cycloid scales.
The body is violet-black, the head often paler. The photophores on the lower sides of the head and body are white.
The species grows to about 14 cm in length.
It is a mesopelagic species that occurs in southern temperate waters worldwide, except off South America.
In Australia it is known from off the central coast of New South Wales to off Tasmania.
View a map of the collecting localities of specimens in the Australian Museum Fish Collection.
The tubeshoulders have a shoulder sac which produces a luminous fluid. It has been suggested that this fluid could be ejected to distract an attacking predator in the same way cephalopods squirt ink.
Related links
- View the deepsea fishes list
Further reading
- Gomon, M.F. in Gomon, M.F., Glover, C.J.M. & R.H. Kuiter (Eds). 1994. The Fishes of Australia's South Coast. State Print, Adelaide. Pp. 992.
- Matsui, T. & Rosenblatt, R.H. 1987. Review of the deep-sea fish family Platytroctidae (Pisces: Salmoniformes). Bulletin of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. 26: 1–159.
