A REVIEW OF THE SERRANID^ OR SEA BASS OF JAPAN. 



By David Starr Jordan and Robert Eari. Richardson, 



OJ Stanford University, California. 



In this paper is given an account of the species of Serranidse, the 

 sea bass and related forms, found in the waters of Japan. 



The material examined was obtained in Japan by Messrs. Jordan 

 and Snyder in 1900, and belongs to Stanford University and to the 

 U. S. National Museum. The drawings, with one exception, were 

 made by Mr. William S. Atkinson. 



Family SERRANIDyE. 



THE SEA BASS. 



Body oblong, more or less compressed, covered with adherent scales 

 of moderate or small size, which are usually ctenoid ; dorsal and ventral 

 outlines not perfectly corresponding. Mouth moderate or large, not 

 very oblique, the premaxillary protractile and the broad maxillary 

 usually not slipping for its whole length into a sheath formed by the 

 preorbital, which is usually narrow. Supplemental maxillary present 

 or absent. Teeth all conical or pointed, in bands, present on jaws, 

 vomer, and palatines. Gill rakers long or short, usually stiff, armed 

 with teeth. Gills 4, a long slit behind the fourth. Pseudobranchise 

 present, large. Lower pharjmgeals rather narrow, with pointed 

 teeth, separate (united in Centrogenys) . Gill membranes separate, 

 free from the isthmus. Branchiostegals normally 7 (occasionally 6). 

 Cheeks and opercles always scaly; preopercle with its margin more 

 less serrate, rarely entire; the opercles usually ending in one or two 

 flat spine-hke points. Nostrils double; Lateral line single, not 

 extending on the caudal fin. Skull without cranial spines and usu- 

 ally without well-developed cavernous structure. No suborbital sta}-. 

 Post-temporal normal. Second suborbital with an internal lamina 

 supporting the globe of the eye; entopterygoid present; all or most 

 of the ribs inserted on the transverse processes when these are devel- 

 oped; anterior vertebrae without transverse processes. Dorsal 

 spines usually stiff, 2 to 15 in number; soft dorsal with 10 to 30 

 rays; anal fin rather short, its soft rays 7 to 12, its spines, if present, 

 always 3, in certain genera (Grammistinse, Ryjyticinse) altogether 



Proceedings U.S. National Museum, Vol. 37— No. 1714. 



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