Paralabrax
Paralabrax is a genus of fishes in the family Serranidae. They are known commonly as rock basses. The nine species in the genus are native to rocky reef habitat in the eastern Pacific and western Atlantic Oceans, where they are often dominant predators in the ecosystem. They are also commercially important in local fisheries.

Brian Gratwicke · CC BY 2.0 · 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
- SerranidaePBDB
- Diet
- carnivorePBDB, for Perciformes
- Life habit
- nektonicPBDB, for Perciformes
- Motility
- actively mobilePBDB, for Perciformes
Time the record covers
At least 59 million years on record.
The record covers at least 59.24 Mya to 129 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 61.66 Mya to 11.7 ka.
4 occurrences of Paralabrax on record, most of them in the Paleocene. 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
4 occurrences- Paleocene25%
- Eocene25%
- Oligocene25%
- Pleistocene25%
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
3 formations
Loading coastlines…
The named rock units Paralabrax has been recovered from, largest first. Drawn where the rock is now, not where it formed. 1 occurrence has no formation on record, which is common for older literature.
Paralabrax and its relatives
PaleoceneWhere Paralabrax and its relatives were recorded in the Paleocene.
Found in the same rock
515 taxa- Sebastes (Sebastodes)2 sites
- Squalus orpiensis2 sites
- Acanthinucella spirata1 site
- Acmaea cassis nacelloides1 site
- Acrodelphinidae1 site
- Acteocina culcitella1 site
- Acteocina inculta1 site
- Acteon traskii1 site
- Adeonellopsis1 site
- Aechmophorus occidentalis1 site
- Alabina tenuisculpta diegensis1 site
- Aligena cerritensis1 site
- Allomorone1 site
- Alopias vulpinus1 site
- Ameritella modesta1 site
- Amia1 site
- Amiantis callosa1 site
- Amphissa reticulata1 site
- Amphissa undata1 site
- Amphissa versicolor1 site
- Anatidae1 site
- Anchoa compressa1 site
- Anisotremus1 site
- Anomia peruviana1 site
The Paleobiology Database records 4 sites for Paralabrax, 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
4 references- Das Sternberger Gestein un seine Artenzahl - Stand 19941
- The London Clay and associated deposits exposed in Chichester Harbour (West Sussex)1
- Les vertébrés du Landènien inférieur (Lla ou Heersien) de Maret (Hameau d'Orp-le-Grand)1
- Additional fish remains, mostly otoliths, from a Pleistocene deposit at Playa del Rey, California1
Each of the 4 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 Paralabrax
- Source
- Wikipedia/Commons
- Credit
- Brian Gratwicke
- Licence
- CC BY 2.0
- Commercial use
- the licence allows it
CT scan
- Source
- MorphoSource
- Licence
- not stated by the source
- Commercial use
- cannot be read from the licence given — check the record
- Specimen
- Paralabrax nebulifer · KU:KUI:28380
Smithsonian Open Access was not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.
The description on this site
- Source
- Wikipedia, “Paralabrax”
- 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 itSerranidae through timeFormations of the PaleoceneThe world it lived on
Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. Girard 1856