Aphia

Aphia minuta, the transparent goby, is a species of the goby native to the northeastern Atlantic Ocean where it can be found from Trondheim, Norway to Morocco. It is also found in the Mediterranean, Black Sea and the Sea of Azov. It is a pelagic species, inhabiting inshore waters and estuaries. It can be found at depths of from the surface to 97 metres (318 ft), though it is usually found at 5 to 80 metres, over sandy and muddy bottoms and also in eelgrass beds. This species can reach a length of 7.9 centimetres (3.1 in) TL. It is an important species to local commercial fisheries. It is currently the only known extant member of its genus. A fossil relative, †Aphia macrophthalma Schwarzhans et al., 2016 is known from the Middle Miocene of Serbia.

Aphia

Etrusko25 · Public Domain · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Sits inside
GobiinaePBDB
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Osteichthyes

Time the record covers

At least 10 million years on record.

The record covers at least 11.63 Mya to 774 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 23.04 Mya to 129 ka.

Oligocene — about 0 of 16 occurrencesMiocene — about 6 of 16 occurrencesMiocenePliocene — about 2 of 16 occurrencesPliocenePleistocene — about 8 of 16 occurrencesPleistocene24–23 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences23–22 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences22–21 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences21–20 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences20–20 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences20–19 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences19–18 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences18–17 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences17–16 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences16–16 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences16–15 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences15–14 Mya — about 0.1 occurrences14–13 Mya — about 0.3 occurrences13–13 Mya — about 0.7 occurrences13–12 Mya — about 1 occurrence12–11 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences11–10 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences10–9.4 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences9.4–8.6 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences8.6–7.8 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences7.8–7.1 Mya — about 0.2 occurrences7.1–6.3 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences6.3–5.5 Mya — about 0.9 occurrences5.5–4.7 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences4.7–3.9 Mya — about 0.5 occurrences3.9–3.1 Mya — about 0.6 occurrences3.1–2.4 Mya — about 1 occurrence2.4–1.6 Mya — about 3 occurrences1.6–785 ka Mya — about 2 occurrences785 ka–0 Mya — about 2 occurrences11.63 Mya774 ka23.5 Mya0 Mya

16 occurrences of Aphia on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group, and the chart stops with its fossils rather than at the present. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

16 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Found in

2 formations

Lindos Bay — 36.09°N, 28.01°ELindos Bay — 36.26°N, 28.17°ELindos Bay — 36.36°N, 28.21°EQuilon — 8.81°N, 76.65°E

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The named rock units Aphia has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 11 occurrences have no formation on record, which is common for older literature.

Aphia and its relatives

Pleistocene

Where Aphia and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.

Found in the same rock

172 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 15 sites for Aphia, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

10 references

Each of the 16 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content2

Picture of Aphia

Credit
Etrusko25
Licence
Public Domain
Commercial use
the licence allows it

CT scan

Licence
In Copyright
Commercial use
cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
Specimen
Aphia minuta · MCZ:Ich:13203

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itGobiinae through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Risso 1826