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Fundulus xenicus

No common name
Collection Details

Specimens

Photos

There are no photos available for this taxon yet.

Records

Taxonomic Hierarchy

Actinopterygii (Ray-finned Fishes) Cyprinodontiformes Fundulidae (Topminnows) Fundulus Fundulus xenicus

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: short and / or deep. Concave dorsal profile from tip of snout to front of dorsal fin (Ref. 26938).

Distribution

Western Central Atlantic: northern Gulf coast from southern tip of Florida to Texas in USA.

Habitat Associations

Freshwater, brackish, marine. benthopelagic.

Biology

Occur from fresh water to hypersaline flats, salt marshes and mangrove areas (Ref. 7251), commonly in shallow water less than 0.3 m in depth (Ref. 45978). Not a seasonal killifish. Is difficult to maintain in aquarium (Ref. 27139).
Max length: 6.0 cm TL.
Reproductive mode: dioecism; fertilization: external; nonguarders (open water/substratum egg scatterers); parental care: none.
IUCN Red List Status: Least Concern (LC), assessed 2014-01-09. Resilience: Low (Fec = 15-40).

Commercial or Environmental Importance

Fisheries: commercial; aquarium: commercial.

References

Robins, C.R. and G.C. Ray (1986) A field guide to Atlantic coast fishes of North America. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, U.S.A. 354 p.
Smith, C.L. (1997) National Audubon Society field guide to tropical marine fishes of the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico, Florida, the Bahamas, and Bermuda. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York. 720 p.
Huber, J.H. (1996) Killi-Data 1996. Updated checklist of taxonomic names, collecting localities and bibliographic references of oviparous Cyprinodont fishes (Atherinomorpha, Pisces). Société Française d'Ichtyologie, Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle, Paris, France, 399 p.
Koenig, C.C. and R.J. Livingston (1976) The embryological development of the diamond killifish (Adinia xenica). Copeia 1976(3):435-445.
Ghedotti, M.J. and M.P. Davis (2013) Phylogeny, classification, and evolution of salinity tolerance of the North American topminnows and killifishes, family Fundulidae (Teleostei: Cypridontiformes). Fieldiana Life and Earth Sciences 7:1-65. DOI: 10.3158/2158-5520-12.7.1

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