Phosichthyidae: D III A1

Vinciguerria nimbaria (Jordan & Williams 1896)

Lightfish

Egg diameter in µm	Number of oil globules	Diameter of oil globule in µm	Yolk texture	Perivitelline space	Position of oil globule at hatch	Gut length   at eye- pigment stage	Myomeres
625-720	0	n/a	segmented	narrow	n/a	76% of NL	ca44

Egg: The small size, coarse yolk segmentation, and lack of an oil globule (A), set this egg apart from all others found in the area, except for DIIIA3, a callionymid. The egg hatched in less than 26 hours (23°C).

Larva: The newly hatched larva is elongate, with a series of black pigment dots dorsally along the notochord, and less conspicuous, ventrally (B). All these move to the ventral edge of the notochord by day 4 (C), when eye pigment and a functional mouth are present. B: newly hatched, C: 4 days.

No attempt was made to rear this egg. Its predominance in offshore samples at Park Rynie, led to this egg becoming a signal of offshore water, when seen in inshore samples. Eleven hatched larvae have been successfully barcoded, all as the same species, but no adults have been collected. Two larvae collected in plankton samples off Park Rynie, fitting the description of V. nimbaria (Ahlstrom & Counts, 1958) have, however, provided a match, along with a matching description of the egg.

 

This is one of the more common eggs in Park Rynie samples (Introductory notes: Section 7, Table 3). They were seen all year round off Park Rynie (blue graph), and, surprisingly, were seen in the DHM samples on three occasions (green graph). It has showed a progressive drop in occurrence off Park Rynie over the period of the study (white graph). The Park Rynie linked samples had 89% offshore, indicating spawning outside the 50m depth contour, where Atractoscion aequidens spawn. See Section 7.3 and Table 1 of the Introductory Notes, for more information on the linked samples.

Linked samples	Offshore	Inshore
Eggs	345	41
Hits	62	17