Fishes Killed by the 1950 Eruption of Mauna Loa 
11. Brotulidae^ 
William A. Gosline^ 
Deep-water brotulids have not hitherto 
been recorded from Hawaii, or, for that mat- 
ter, from the Central Pacific Ocean. The Mau- 
na Loa collections contain five brotulid species 
belonging to four genera. None of the species 
can be allocated to known forms with any 
certainty, and three of them are described as 
new. One of the genera appears to be new. 
Unfortunately, as is true of many deep- 
water collections, each of the species is rep- 
resented by a single specimen. This restricts 
the possible value of the present report in 
two ways. In the first place, the type and 
range of variation within these Hawaiian spe- 
cies must remain for the present unknown, 
and the possibility exists that the specific and 
generic descriptions are based on aberrant 
individuals. However, only one of the spec- 
imens at hand , which has a regenerated tail 
shows any obvious abnormality. Fortunately, 
all are adult or subadult and in good condi- 
tion. The second, and perhaps more serious, 
restriction lies in the infeasibility of dissecting 
such specimens. I have indicated elsewhere 
(in press) the great variability of the internal 
characters in brotulids. It seems improbable 
that a sound classification of this family can 
ignore internal anatomy, yet it has been 
deemed advisable to forego investigation of 
most such structures in the specimens at hand. 
However, if all specimens had represented 
the same species, no insight into brotulid 
variation at the specific and generic level 
could have been obtained. As it is, a com- 
^ Contribution No. 42, Hawaii Marine Laboratory. 
2 Department of Zoology and Entomology, Uni- 
versity of Hawaii. Manuscript received January 17, 
1953. 
parison between the Hawaiian specimens has 
brought to light a few hitherto unused char- 
acters which may prove of value in the 
classification of the family as a whole. 
This paper is limited to descriptive taxon- 
omy in its narrow sense, but in the present 
rudimentary state of knowledge concerning 
the fishes of the family Brotulidae little else 
is possible. The best that can be hoped, there- 
fore, is that the rather full descriptions that 
follow will make the specimens described 
identifiable to future workers and that these 
Hawaiian records can hence be incorporated 
into the groundwork necessary for any sound 
conclusions concerning brotulid derivation, 
phylogeny, and distribution. 
Before the various species are described, 
it seems advisable to comment on two mor- 
phological characters. 
One is the nature of the copulatory organ 
in the males of many brotulids. Hubbs (1938: 
288) states, "The structure of the clasper-like 
penis will probably prove to be one of the 
most trenchant characters by which to sep- 
arate the several genera of Brosmophycinae.” 
Although I do not disagree with Hubbs ’s 
statement, I have found the character of the 
copulatory organ of the available male bro- 
tulids difficult to use taxonomically. In the 
first place, there seem to be no hard parts in | 
this rather complicated organ, and the relative | 
positions of its soft structures seem to depend ji 
considerably on the preservation of the spec- j; 
imen. Whether, as stated in the literature, | 
this organ varies from individual to individual 
is impossible for me to determine, but I am 
inclined to believe that the observed varia- ' 
tions are due to differences of preservation. 
68 
