Synopsis of Biological Data on 

 Striped Marlin, Tetrapturus audax (Philippi), 1887 



SHOJI UEYANAGI 1 and PAUL G. WARES 2 



1 IDENTITY 



1.1 Nomenclature 



1.11 Valid Name 



Tetrapturus audax (Philippi), 1887 is the name 

 adopted by the most recent review of the family 

 (Nakamura, Iwai, and Matsubara, 1968). The original 

 combination was Histiophorus audax Philippi, 

 1887. Anal. Univ. Chile 71:34-39. 



1.12 Objective synonymy 



All synonyms are assumed to be subjective without 

 consulting original papers and are listed under section 

 1.21. 



1.2 Taxonomy 

 1.21 Affinities 



Suprageneric 



Phylum Chordata 



Subphylum Vertebrata 

 Superclass Gnathostomata 

 Class Osteichthyes 

 Subclass Actinopterygii 

 Order Perciformes 

 Suborder Xiphioidei 

 Family Istiophoridae 



Generic 

 Genus Tetrapturus Rafinesque, 1810. 



Caratteri di alcuni nuovi generi e nuove specie di 

 animali [principalmente di pesci] e piante della 

 Sicilia, con varie osservazioni sopra i medisimi. Paler- 

 mo, 105 p. 



'Fisheries Agency of Japan, Far Seas Fisheries Research Labora- 

 tory, Shimizu 424, Japan. 



'Southwest Fisheries Center, National Marine Fisheries Service, 

 NOAA, Tiburon, CA 94920; present address: Northwest Fisheries 

 Program, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, 495 Tyee Drive, Turn- 

 water, WA 98502. 



Type-species Tetrapturus belone Rafinesque, 1810. 



Robins and de Sylva (1960, 1963) placed the striped 

 marlin in Tetrapturus, following the works of 

 hierarchical classification of the family by Hirasaka 

 and Nakamura (1947) and Nakamura (1949). This 

 placement of audax in Tetrapturus is supported by 

 Ueyanagi (1963b), Howard and Ueyanagi (1965), and 

 Nakamura et al. (1968). 



We follow the generic concept of Nakamura et al. 

 (1968), who described the genus as follows: 



The height of the dorsal fin is greater than the body depth. The 

 ventral fin rays are rather long, the fin membrane not well 

 developed. The body is compressed (flat) and except for the 

 striped marlin (Makajiki) and the white marlin (Nishimaka- 

 jiki), extends in a straight line from the pre-occular area to the 

 base of the dorsal fin. The cranium is long and narrow. The 

 neural and haemal spines of the central vertebrae form a 

 parallelogram. There are 24 vertebrae (12 + 12 = 24). The 

 lateral appophysis 3 is not well developed. 



These authors include the following species in the 

 genus: T. angustirostris Tanaka, 1914; T. belone 

 Rafinesque, 1810; T. pfluegeri Robins and de Sylva, 

 1963; T. albidus Poey, 1861; T. audax (Philippi, 



1887). 



Specific 



Identity of type specimen: 



Species T. audax (Philippi, 1887). 



Type specimen: Apparently one of the two deposited 

 in the Museo Nacional de Historia Natural, Santiago, 

 Chile by Rudolfo A. Philippi. 



Type Locality: Iquique, Chile. 



Diagnosis: Ventral fins and two caudal keels are pres- 

 ent; snout cross section is nearly circular; first dorsal 

 fin anteriorly is about same height as body depth or 

 greater 4 and is not saillike but slopes abruptly 



'See Ueyanagi and Watanabe (1965) for usage of this term. 



'Due to allometric growth of the dorsal fin relative to body depth 

 the fin height may be less than body depth in fish larger than 360 

 cm FL (Royce, 1957). 



132 



