EPOB 3770—Vertebrate Zoology
Spring Semester 2004
FISH LINKS
THE VARIOUS FISH GROUPS
1. What is up with the term Osteichthyes?
Osteichthyes are
the bony fish, a group paraphyletic to the land vertebrates and which
sometimes includes them. Most fish within the old term osteichthyes
belong to the Actinopterygii. The others are called lobe-finned fish
(Sarcopterygii), and include lungfish and coelacanths. The Osteichthyes
were traditionally treated as a class of vertebrates, with subclasses
Actinopterygii and Sarcopterygii, but newer schemes may divide them
into several separate classes such that Actinopterygii and
Sarcopterygii are now a class in themselves (what you are being
taught). The phase-out of the term Osteichthyes comes from a desire to
represent only monophyletic groups in classification schemes. In a
sense, the Grade Teleostomi has now replaced Osteichthyes in order to
include tetrapods in a group at a higher level than CLASS. Perhaps
looking at a few phylogenies may help:
1.
2.
In both of these you will notice that the line leading to tetrapods and the line leading to the Actinopterygian fishes diverge. Keeping the old Class Osteichthyes then became problematic as this group was paraphyletic and the current goal is to represent monophyletic groups. This new scheme is widely accepted.
The Actinopterygii
University
of Michigan Animal Diversity Web
In general, you will find that the ADW
is a very good resource overall.
FISH ANATOMY
A
dissected view of gill rakers, gill fillaments and the gill arch
Teeth
I
Teeth II (plus more gill rakers)
Teeth
III (tooth types of bony fish)
Teeth
IV (tooth location patterns)
The
Gill Arches
A
ventral view of gill arches and branchiostegal rays
Scale types I
Internal
fish anatomy I
Internal fish anatomy 2
Fish
skull I (use this to find various features you need to know
The Ichthyology Department at the Florida
Museum of Natural History has some great fish info: Check them out
