FISHES OF THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS AND ADJACENT SEAS 455 



GYMNURA CROOKI Fowler 



Figure 12 



Gymnura crooki Fowler, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Philadelphia, vol. 85, p. 241, fig, 

 6, 1933 (type locality: Kowloon, China). 



Depth 14 to end of tail ; head 4i/^ ; disk length 1% its width ; tail 

 2 in disk length. Snout 1% in head, forms short blunt end of wide 

 obtuse angle of front profile; eye 9 in head, 6 in snout, 5I/2 in inter- 

 orbital; mouth width 2 in head; teeth in 65 rows above, 45 below, 

 each tooth with 1 to 3 slender cusps of which median largest ; nostril 

 broad, oblique, internarial 3i/^ in mouth width, front valve broad 

 lobe, hind valve low short fold extending halfway to internarial; 

 interorbital 1% in head, broad, nearly level except concave depres- 

 sion due to broad fontanel. Gill openings small, last smallest, equi- 

 distant. Spiracle large, oblique, deep, twice eye. 



Skin smooth. No caudal spine. 



No dorsal. Scarcely an anal developed, unless low rudimentary 

 ridge on tail below. Tail rather robust, flexible, tapers to rather 

 strong point. Pectoral wide lobes, front edge little concave and 

 hind edge little convex, apex broadly convex. Ventral small, long, 

 with claspers conic, rather large and along inner edge of ventral 

 long as its outer edge, which 2 in head. 



Back uniform dusky brown. Below whitish. Tail light or pale 

 brownish, irregularly blotched or spotted above with dark brown, 

 like back, only about half of blotches crossing over lower surface of 

 tail narrowly and of more pale tint than above. 



My specimen differs from Schlegel's plate of Pteroplatea japonica 

 in that it not only has no trace of a caudal spine and no trace of 

 any removal of such, could it have been present, but also the 

 coloration of the tail is very different. Schlegel's figure shows the 

 tail as whitish with 5 black, well-contrasted transverse bands, the 

 terminal 3 of which are clearly wider than the pale interspaces. 

 My specimen also shows a hard knoblike denticle on the lower jaw 

 each side of the middle and projecting, each of these knobs about 

 opposite the limit of the internarial space. 



GYMNURA MICRURA (Schneider) 



Raja micrura Schneidee, Syst. Ichth. Bloch, p. 360, 1801 (type locality: "Suri- 

 nam" [likely erroneous] ). 



Trygonohatus micriirus Blainville, Bull. Soc. Philom., Paris, vol. 8, p. 112, 1816 

 (name only). 



Pteroplatea micrura Cantor, Journ. Asiatic Soc. Bengal, vol. 18, p. 1409, 1849 

 (Pinang, Malay Peninsula, Singapore). — Day, Fishes of Malabar, p. 278, 

 1865.— Bartlett, Sarawak Gazette, vol. 26, No. 366, p. 134, 1896 (Buntal 

 and Moratabas). — Dunckee, Mitt. Naturhist. Mus. Hamburg, vol. 21, p. 194, 

 1904 (locality?).— FowLEE, Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Philadelphia, 1905, p. 461 

 156S61— 41 30 



