Canthigaster valentini (Bleeker, 1853)

Patankar, Vardhan, Paranjape, Akhila, Tyabji, Zoya, Wagh, Tanmay & Marathe, Aniruddha, 2018, Occurrence and distribution of tetraodontiform fishes of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, India, Check List 14 (3), pp. 529-537 : 534

Canthigaster valentini (Bleeker, 1853)

We observed 6 individuals at 4 islands (4 sites) in the East Andaman and Central and Southern Nicobar

regions. Body white with light brown spots and 4 dark brown to brackish saddles, the middle 2 saddles extend onto the ventral side.

Patterns in species richness. We documented 25 species across 16 genera and 6 families ( Table 1). Cumulative species richness was highest in Southern Nicobar, Cen- tral Nicobar, and South Andaman regions ( Fig. 4 ). Nine species were found only on a single island, while most species (n = 17) were found at fewer than 5 islands.

The highest species richness within the 6 regions was in the Central Nicobar and Southern Nicobar regions (n = 17 spp.), as compared to Middle Andaman region (n = 7 spp.) ( Table 2). A few species, i.e., Balistapus undulatus , Melichthys indicus , Sufflamen bursa , S. chrysopterus , and Arothron nigropunctatus , were common at all sites (n = 52). In contrast, Balistoides conspicillum , Melichthys vidua , Chilomycterus reticulatus , Oxymonacanthus lon- girostris, Ostracion melegris , Canthigaster amboinesis , and C. coronata were rare and were reported only once during our surveys ( Table 1).

Figures

Figure 4. Non-randomized cumulative species accumulation curves with sites ordered from southern Nicobar to northern Andaman Islands.The reported number of species was highest at sites located at Nicobar and South Andaman regions, where they contribute to 17 out of the 25 species reported. Among islands towards higher latitudes, the curve shows an increase at the Japanese bunker site after which only 3 species were added to the curve for 39 sampled islands in middle and North Andaman regions.