Setipinna taty (Valenciennes, 1848)

Zainal Abidin, Danial Hariz, Lavoué, Sébastien, Mohd Abu Hassan Alshari, Norli Fauzani, Mohd. Nor, Siti Azizah, A. Rahim, Masazurah & Mohammed Akib, Noor Adelyna, 2021, Ichthyofauna of Sungai Merbok Mangrove Forest Reserve, northwest Peninsular Malaysia, and its adjacent marine waters, Check List 17 (2), pp. 601-631 : 611

Setipinna taty (Valenciennes, 1848)

Figure 3E

Material examined. MALAYSIA • 1, 141 mm TL; Kedah State, Merbok, Pompang Sungai Merbok ; 05.664°N, 100.381°E; 6 Dec. 2018; Danial H. Zainal Abidin, Norli F.M.A.H. Alshari leg.; USMFC (82) 00047 .

Identification. A moderate sized species of anchovy (maximum SL <200 mm); body strongly laterally compressed; longer than deeper; very large mouth, its corner well behind the eye; anal fin rays 18 or 19; belly strongly keeled with 22–27 prepelvic scutes and 11 or 12 postpelvic scutes; gill rakers 18–20 only (on first gill arch); scales present on dorsal and anal fins; pectoral fin with a long filament reaching the posterior half of the anal fin; body uniformly silver sometimes orangish; no silver longitudinal stripe; no dark pigment line on back ( Whitehead et al. 1988).

The presence of a long pectoral filament makes it easy to separate S. taty from other species of anchovy recorded from the Merbok estuary. Setipinna taty is a predominantly coastal marine species although commonly frequenting brackish ecosystems of this region; it does not seem to form large school. Otherwise, widely distributed in the Indo-West Pacific region ( Whitehead et al. 1988).