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Bagre panamensis

Chihuil
Collection Details

Specimens

Photos

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Records

Taxonomic Hierarchy

Actinopterygii (Ray-finned Fishes) Siluriformes (Catfishes) Ariidae (Sea Catfishes) Bagre Bagre panamensis (Chihuil)

Description

This species account was compiled from FishBase (Froese, R. and D. Pauly. Editors. 2025. FishBase. World Wide Web electronic publication. www.fishbase.org, version 04/2025.) and processed using AI-assisted text extraction. It may contain errors in spelling, punctuation, or formatting. When citing, please reference the original source rather than this page. Learn more about our species accounts.

Characters

Body shape: fusiform / normal.

Distribution

Eastern Pacific: off Santa Ana River in southern California, USA to Peru. Rare north of southern Baja California, Mexico.

Habitat Associations

Brackish, marine. demersal. depth range 3-177 m. Found in: estuaries.

Biology

Found inshore, usually on muddy bottoms. Enters estuaries (Ref. 11035). Spine in front of the dorsal and pectoral fins is venomous and can cause a painful wound. Marketed fresh (Ref. 9271).
Max length: 51.0 cm TL.
IUCN Red List Status: Least Concern (LC), assessed 2007-05-22. Resilience: Medium (Preliminary K or Fecundity.).

Commercial or Environmental Importance

Fisheries: commercial.

References

Eschmeyer, W.N., E.S. Herald and H. Hammann (1983) A field guide to Pacific coast fishes of North America. Boston (MA, USA): Houghton Mifflin Company. xii+336 p.
Marceniuk, A.P. and C.J. Ferraris Jr. (2003) Ariidae (Sea catfishes). p. 447-455. In R.E. Reis, S.O. Kullander and C.J. Ferraris, Jr. (eds.) Checklist of the freshwater fishes of South and Central America. Porto Alegre: EDIPUCRS, Brasil.
Love, M.S., C.W. Mecklenburg, T.A. Mecklenburg and L.K. Thorsteinson (2005) Resource inventory of marine and estuarine fishes of the West Coast and Alaska: A checklist of North Pacific and Arctic Ocean species from Baja California to the Alaska-Yukon border. U.S. Department of the Interior, U.S. Geological Survey, Biological Resources Division, Seattle, Washington, 98104.
Muro, V. and F. Amezcuav (2011) Observations on the reproductive biology of the chihuil sea catfish in the southeast Gulf of California: implications for management. American Fisheries Society Symposium 77.

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