Melichthys niger (Bloch, 1786)

Love, Milton S., Bizzarro, Joseph J., Cornthwaite, Maria, Frable, Benjamin W. & Maslenikov, Katherine P., 2021, Checklist of marine and estuarine fishes from the Alaska-Yukon Border, Beaufort Sea, to Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, Zootaxa 5053 (1), pp. 1-285 : 223

Melichthys niger (Bloch, 1786) .

Black Durgon or Black Triggerfish. To 51 cm (20 in) TL ( Eschmeyer and Herald 1983). Circumglobal; western Pacific Ocean north to Ryukyu Islands, Japan (Hayashi in Nakabo 2002); San Diego, southern California to southern Gulf of California ( Robertson and Allen 2002), Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia ( Robertson and Allen 2015), and Ecuador, including Islas Galápagos ( Grove and Lavenberg 1997). Not confirmed north of Mexico since it was reported off San Diego in the 1800s ( Miller and Lea 1972, Eschmeyer and Herald 1983). A report of this fish from Metlatkatla, Alaska ( Karinen et al. 1985), represents a misidentified Balistes polylepis Steindachner, 1876 (Mecklenburg et al. 2002). Benthic; depth: surface to 75 m (246 ft) (min.: Lieske and Myers 2002; max.: Matsuura in Carpenter and Niem 2001).