First Semester 2020/2021

What is ichthyology the study of?

Ichthyology, scientific study of fishes, including other specialized

subdisciplines such as taxonomy, anatomy, behavioral science
(ethology), ecology, and physiology

Why is it important to study fish?

A thorough knowledge of fish diversity, distributions, habitat

requirements and life histories is essential to the management
of fisheries, and conservation of species and the aquatic
environment as a whole.
“Aberrant meaning deviating from the ordinary, usual or normal type”
 Most of the fishes
that have gone
extinct are studied
through fossil study,
this branch of science
called ‘paleontology’
have allowed us to
know the old age fish
and how they are
being linked to the
present fish status

There is a lot of art in

the interpretation of
these fossils!
Fish fossil
Based on above definition fish, Fishes are primary aquatic vertebrates, taking
up oxygen from the water with gills (with exceptions).

All land vertebrates like amphibians, reptiles, birds and mammals are
descendants of one specialized lineage of sarcopterygian fishes which
transitioned to life on land.

The beginning of the evolutionary history of fishes is hence the beginning of

vertebrate evolution, and hence the beginning of chordate evolution
Early Beginnings

All vertebrates are chordates (Phylum Chordata), but primitive chordates are not vertebrates.

A chordate is defined by having a chorda, a flexible rod on its dorsal side, and segmented muscles,
laterally arranged, plus a dorsal nerve chord.

The first chordates were basically swimming worms with a flexible stick along their backs to
counteract the lateral muscle forces during swimming.

As almost every other phylum, the chordates first appeared in the Cambrian, during an event of rapid
evolutionary radiation called the “Cambrian explosion”.

There is a surprising wealth of fossils from the Cambrian, given that it lies more than half a billion
years in the past and that the animals were usually small and soft-bodied.

A paper detailing fossils of what are believed to be the very first chordates is this:

Shu, D. G., Luo, H. L., Morris, S. C., Zhang, X. L., Hu, S. X., Chen, L., & Chen, L. Z. (1999).
Lower Cambrian vertebrates from south China. Nature, 402(6757), 42-46.
Chordates show four features, at different stages in their life.
They are:

1) Notochord– It is a longitudinal rod that is made of cartilage and runs

between the nerve cord and the digestive tract. Its main function is to
support the nerve cord. In Vertebrate animals, the vertebral column
replaces the notochord.

2) Dorsal Nerve Cord – This is a bundle of nerve fibres which connects the
brain to the muscles and other organs.

3) Post-anal tail – This is an extension of the body beyond the anus. In

some chordates, the tail has skeletal muscles, which help in locomotion.

4) Pharyngeal slits–They are the openings which connect the mouth and
the throat. These openings allow the entry of water through the mouth,
without entering the digestive system.
This phylum is a very diverse phylum, with about 43,000 species.

Most of these organisms can be found in the subphylum Vertebrata. In the animal kingdom, this is
considered as the third largest phylum.

Phylum Chordata is again divided into three subphyla. They are:

Urochordata
Cephalaochordata
Vertebrata

The first two phyla have very few species in between them. The major subphylum is Vertebrata,
where you come across a variety of fishes, reptiles, birds and animals.

Vertebrates have a distinguishing backbone that is made up of bone or cartilage. The brain is enclosed
in a skull. There is a proper circulatory system, nervous system and a skeletal system that gives proper
shape and support.
Subphylum Vertebrata is further divided into
five classes. They are:

Pisces

Amphibia

Reptilia

Aves

Mammalia
We are also lucky enough to have
one small group of animals survive
from these early chordates – the
amphioxus, a small marine, filter
feeding fish-like animal.

The amphioxus’ gene expression in

its nervous system is comparable to
that of a vertebrate – a clear
indication of an evolutionary
continuity between these primitive
chordates and more derived
vertebrates.
Next: Skull

Basically, next came the invention of a

skull.

Again, we are lucky enough to have

“living fossils” – the hagfish and the
lamprey.

The lamprey is a fish-parasite living in

freshwater, while the hagfish are deep-
sea predators and scavengers.

Lamprey
Hagfish
These days we have just a few species, relatively rare (I have never seen one) of
these agnathan (jaw-less) fishes, but in Paleozoic times they flourished.

Agnatha (Ancient Greek ἀ-γνάθος "no jaws") is a superclass of jawless fish in the
phylum Chordata, subphylum Vertebrata, consisting of both present (cyclostomes:
hagfish and lamprey) and extinct (conodonts and ostracoderms) species.

Species diversity was high, and larger, heavily armoured forms evolved.

They all died out by the end of the Devonian, out-competed by their jawed successors

The group is sister to all vertebrates with jaws, known as gnathostomes.

The evolution of fish began about 530 million ostracoderm
years ago during the Cambrian explosion.

It was during this time that the

early chordates developed the skull and
the vertebral column, leading to the
first craniates and vertebrates. conodont

The first fish lineages belong to the Agnatha, or

jawless fish. Early examples include Haikouichthys.
During the late Cambrian, eel-like jawless fish
called the conodonts, and small mostly armoured
fish known as ostracoderms, first appeared. hagfish

Most jawless fish are now extinct; but the

extant lampreys may approximate ancient pre-
lamprey
jawed fish. Lampreys belong to the Cyclostomata,
which includes the extant hagfish, and this group
may have split early on from other agnathans.
Jaws (no, not the movie!)

The next step was crucial in the development of all future vertebrates – you probably
guessed it, the origin of the jaw.

An excellent narrative of this

step, and of early fish
evolution in general plus of
later radations is given in
Benton’s book:
A cladogram detailing the relationships between all these lineages, and when they arose and died out:
Placoderms – jawed fishes, with heavy bony plates covering their bodies,
the bigger ones were the apex predators of their times.

The 6 meter long Dunkleosteus was akin to the Great White Shark of Devonian
times. Possibly they were out-competed by sharks and hence died out. The
placoderms were close to the first jawed fishes.

While the placodermes swam in the oceans of the Devonian and early
Carboniferous, a very, very long time ago, they were already far from “primitive
fishes”. Besides some of them probably being fearsome predators, the males
had developed claspers for internal fertilization

And the females carried the developing embryos inside their bodies, possibly
the first examples of internal fertilization and development in vertebrates
Placoderms – jawed fishes, with heavy bony plates covering their bodies, the bigger ones were the
apex predators of their times. The 6 meter long Dunkleosteus was akin to the Great White Shark of
Devonian times.
Acanthodii – a group which
flourished in the Paleozoic,
sometimes called the “spiny
sharks”, due to the fact that
they had features of bony fishes
and sharks. A successful group f
mid-sized to smaller fishes in
the Paleozoic, which however
died out by the late
Carboniferous.
Sarcopterygii – the lobe fined fishes are close to the first land animals
(tetrapods). Presently, only a few species of “living fossils” remain on deep reefs,
while in the Paleozoic they were very species rich, and dominated many marine and
freshwater ecosystems, often with large-bodied species.
Example is Coelacanth
 Diving with Coelocanths

https://youtu.be/Z_ThemgWNiE?t=847

This video is part of the banquet presentation given by Richard Pyle at the 2013 Marine Aquarium
Conference of North America (MACNA) in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. It represents a video overview of a series
of dives conducted in 2011 off Sodwana Bay, South Africa, to find and film living Coelacanths. The video
also shows what the habitat looks like at depths of 100-120 meters (330-400 feet) off Sodwana Bay. The
dives were led by Peter Timm, and filmed by Robert Whitton, Daniel Stevenson and Richard Pyle.
 Coelacanths (seel-a-canths) were once known only from fossils and were thought to
have gone extinct approximately 65 million years ago (mya), during the great
extinction in which the dinosaurs disappeared. The most recent fossil record dates
from about 80 mya but the earliest records date back as far as approximately 360 mya.
At one time coelacanths were a large group comprising about 90 valid species that
were distributed worldwide in both marine and freshwaters. Today, there are two
known living species.

The first living coelacanth was discovered in 1938 and bears the scientific name Latimeria
chalumnae. The species was described by Professor J.L.B. Smith in 1939 and was named
after its discoverer, Miss Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer

In September 1997 and again in July 1998, coelacanths were captured in northern Sulawesi, Indonesia, nearly
6,000 miles to the east of the Comoros. The Indonesian discovery was made by Mark V. Erdmann, Although the
Indonesian specimens superficially resemble those in the western Indian Ocean, analyses of DNA from tissue
samples from one of the Indonesian specimens revealed significant genetic differentiation from the Indian
Ocean population. The authors of two studies have suggested that the two populations have been separated for
at least several millions of years. The Indonesian form was described as a new species, Latimeria
menadoensis, in April 1999, by L. Pouyard and several Indonesian colleagues.
Preserved specimen of Latimeria chalumnae from the Fish Division specimen collection at
the National Museum of Natural History USA
During the Devonian period a great increase in fish variety occurred, especially among the
ostracoderms and placoderms, and also among the lobe-finned fish and early sharks.

This has led to the Devonian being known as the age of fishes. It was from the lobe-finned
fish that the tetrapods evolved, the four-limbed vertebrates, represented today
by amphibians, reptiles, mammals, and birds.

Transitional tetrapods first appeared during the early Devonian, and by the late Devonian
the first tetrapods appeared. The diversity of jawed vertebrates may indicate the
evolutionary advantage of a jawed mouth; but it is unclear if the advantage of a hinged
jaw is greater biting force, improved respiration, or a combination of factors.

Fish do not represent a monophyletic group, but a paraphyletic one, as they exclude
the tetrapods.
A cladogram detailing the relationships between all these lineages, and when they arose and died out:
A cladogram of the evolution of
tetrapods showing some of the best-
known transitional fossils. It starts
with Eusthenopteron at the bottom,
indisputably still a fish,
through Panderichthys, Tiktaalik, Aca
nthostegaand Ichthyostega to Peder
pes at the top, indisputably a
tetrapod
Sharks, Rays and Chimeras –
we all know the Great White
Shark and the Tiger
Shark and several other
large, carnivorous, torpedo-
shaped sharks. There are
some bottom-dwelling and
some deep sea species which
look and feed very different,
but in many shallow-water
ecosystems these days few
shark species live, and these
are often large and mostly
near the top of the food
chain.
Rhincodon typus
The biggest fish in the ocean is the Rhincodon typus or whale shark. Despite
their tremendous size and intimidating appearance, whale sharks are commonly
docile and approachable.
The jawed fish that are still extant in modern days also appeared during the
late Silurian: the Chondrichthyes (or cartilaginous fish) and
the Osteichthyes (or bony fish).

The bony fish evolved into two separate groups: the Actinopterygii (or ray-
finned fish) and Sarcopterygii (which includes the lobe-finned fish).
Chondrostei is a group of
primarily cartilaginous fish
showing some degree of
ossification. The cartilaginous
condition is thought to be
derived, and the ancestors of
this group were bony fish with
fully ossified skeletons
Holostei is a group of bony fish including gars and bowfins. There are eight species divided among
two orders: the Amiiformes, represented by a single living species, the bowfin; and the
Lepisosteiformes, represented by seven living species in two genera, the gars.
Teleostei (Greek: teleios,
"complete" + osteon, "bone"),
members of which are known as
teleosts, is by far the largest
infraclass in the class Actinopterygii,
the ray-finned fishes, containing 96%
of all extant species of fish. Teleosts
are arranged into about 40 orders
and 448 families.
Fish, like many other organisms, have been greatly affected by extinction
events throughout natural history.

The earliest ones, the Ordovician–Silurian extinction events, led to the loss of
many species.

The late Devonian extinction led to the extinction of the ostracoderms and
placoderms by the end of the Devonian, as well as other fish.

The spiny sharks became extinct at the Permian–Triassic extinction event; the
conodonts became extinct at the Triassic–Jurassic extinction event.

The Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event, and the present day Holocene

extinction, have also affected fish variety and fish stocks.