PROCEEDINGS OF THE UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



issued 



SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION 



U. S. NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Vol. 86 Washington: 1939 No. 3060 



A KEVISION OF THE TOADFISHES REFERRED TO 

 PORICHTHYS AND RELATED GENERA 



By Carl L. Hubbs and Leonard P. Schultz 



In identifying a second species of Porichthys occurring along the 

 coasts of southern California and Lower California, we found that 

 the species referred to this American genus stand in need of revision. 

 We have therefore studied all the material of these species in the 

 United States National Museimi, in the Museum of Zoology of the 

 Univei*sity of Michigan, and in the museum of Stanford University 

 and have examined the pertinent literature, as the basis for the present 

 paper. One new genus and two new species are described : 



Aphos (for Batrachus porosus Valenciennes). 



Porichthys myriaster (sontliern California and Lower California). 



Porichthys analis (Gulf of California). 



The toadfishes treated are those members of the family Batrachoi- 

 didae having the following characters: 2 dorsal spines and 1 strong 

 opercular spine, both solid and without connected poison glands; 

 subopercle small, without spine; some of the teeth caninelike; no 

 scales; 4- lateral lines. With the exception of the Chilean and Peru- 

 vian porosus^ here made the type of a distinct genus, Aphos, all species 

 of this gi'oup have rows of many photophores (Greene, 1899) follow- 

 ing the course of the multiple lateral lines. The presence of these 

 organs is therefore not consistently associated with the increased niun- 

 ber of the lateral lines and does not seem to furnish warrant for the 

 separation of a family Porichthyidae, as proposed by Ribeiro (1915). 



We separate another genus from Porichfhy.<^, recognizing Nauto- 

 paedium Jordan for porosissimum, the single, wide-ranging Atlantic 

 species of the group. Thus Porichthys, with 5 or 6 species, is re- 



473 



121760—39 1 



