Argyropelecus affinis

Argyropelecus affinis is a species of ray-finned fish in the family Sternoptychidae, described by Garman in 1899, found in the tropical and subtropical Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans. Common names for this fish include Pacific hatchetfish, deepsea hatchetfish and slender hatchetfish. It inhabits the upper mesopelagic zone between 350 and 600m during the day, and between 100m and 350m during the night and is either non-migratory or performs short daily vertical migrations. They are distributed widely throughout all tropical and temperate seas. They are known for its laterally compressed body and characteristic photophores, which aid in bioluminescence. Argyropelecus affinis is closely related to Argyropelecus gigas.

Argyropelecus affinis

Chun, Carl Illustrator: Friedrich Wilhelm Winter · 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
ArgyropelecusPBDB
Diet
carnivorePBDB, for Sternoptychidae
Life habit
nektonic, depth=deepPBDB, for Sternoptychidae
Motility
fast-movingPBDB, for Sternoptychidae
Vision
well-developedPBDB, for Sternoptychidae
Environment
oceanic,marinePBDB, for Sternoptychidae

Time the record covers

At most 4.4 million years on record.

The one occurrence read is dated to somewhere between 15.98 Mya and 11.63 Mya, which is a dating window rather than a span.

Miocene — about 1 of 1 occurrenceMiocene16–16 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences16–16 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences16–16 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences16–15 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences15–15 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences15–15 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences15–15 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences15–15 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences15–15 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences15–14 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences14–14 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences14–14 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences14–14 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences14–14 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences14–13 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences13–13 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences13–13 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences13–13 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences13–13 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences13–13 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences13–12 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences12–12 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences12–12 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences12–12 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences12–12 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences12–11 Mya — about 0.0 occurrences16.5 Mya11.1 Mya

1 occurrence of Argyropelecus affinis on record, most of them in the Miocene. 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

1 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

1 formation

Monterey — 33.71°N, 118.28°W

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The named rock units Argyropelecus affinis has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed.

Argyropelecus affinis and its relatives

Miocene

Where Argyropelecus affinis and its relatives were recorded in the Miocene.

Found in the same rock

4 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 1 site for Argyropelecus affinis, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too.

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

1 reference

Each of the 1 occurrence 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. Each entry links to the Paleobiology Database's own record for the work.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Argyropelecus affinis

Credit
Chun, Carl Illustrator: Friedrich Wilhelm Winter
Licence
Public Domain
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Argyropelecus affinis was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

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 itArgyropelecus through timeFormations of the MioceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Garman 1899