Deltentosteus collonianus ( Risso, 1820 )

Kovačić, Marcelo, Renoult, Julien P., Pillon, Roberto, Svensen, Rudolf, Bogorodsky, Sergey V., Engin, Semih & Louisy, Patrick, 2022, Identification of Mediterranean marine gobies (Actinopterygii: Gobiidae) of the continental shelf from photographs of in situ individuals, Zootaxa 5144 (1), pp. 1-103 : 49-50

Deltentosteus collonianus ( Risso, 1820) ( Fig. 51 )—Toothed Goby

Gobius collonianus Risso, 1820: 252 ; type locality: northwestern Mediterranean Sea , France, Nice .

Size. Maximum size 7 cm total length (Miller 1986).

Morphology. D VI + I,10–11; A I,10–11; P 17 (Miller 1986; Kovačić & Golani 2007b). Moderately small goby with subcylindrical body, laterally compressed towards caudal fin, head slightly depressed and moderately large. Snout large and pointed. Eyes lateral, interorbital moderately wide. Mouth superior, oblique, tip of lower jaw at horizontal level of pupil. Angle of jaws below rear half of orbit. Predorsal area and nape scaled. Caudal peduncle slender, lower than body. The first dorsal fin higher than the second dorsal fin, no elongated spines, but breeding males with notably enlarged, sail-shaped, first dorsal fin ( Fig. 51b ) ( Louisy 2015; Le Bris et al. 2017; 2019a). Caudal fin truncate to slightly emarginate.

Live coloration. Body dorsally mainly brown or beige with 5 pale dorsal saddles, each above a midlateral dark blotch including one at the caudal-fin base ( Fig. 51 ). The saddles on the back generally conspicuous and usually with black anterior and posterior outlines. The midlateral dark blotches of irregular rhomboid to rounded shape, anteriorly about 1/3 of body height. Black mark on caudal-fin base triangular and larger than other midlateral marks. Ventral half of body whitish. The first dorsal fin without dark markings in females; one or two black spots on rear margin in males ( Le Bris et al. 2017; 2019a) ( Fig. 51 ).

Similar species. Deltentosteus quadrimaculatus , Pomatoschistus adriaticus .

Habitat. Infralittoral to circalittoral species, known from 1.5–120 m on soft bottoms and seagrass meadows (Miller 1986; Le Bris et al. 2017; Iglésias et al. 2021b; Patzner 2021).

Geographic distribution. Mediterranean and adjacent Atlantic Ocean. D. collonianus is known from the eastern Atlantic coast of Portugal (Miller 1986). In the Mediterranean, it is known from the western basin to the Adriatic Sea (Miller 1986). It was later reported from Levant ( Kovačić & Golani 2007b).

Figures

FIGURE 51. Live coloration in its natural habitat of Deltentosteus collonianus. A) photo by S. Guerrieri, Tuscany, Italy. B) Breeding male (the rounded, notably enlarged first dorsal fin, has been injured), photo by S. Le Bris, Saména, Southern France.