3 species of fish recorded in St Martin’s Island
Approximately over 750 species of marine fish have been recorded from the brackish and marine waters of Bangladesh. Species of fish are still being added to the existing fauna of Bangladesh and several new fish species were added into the countries fish checklist in the last few years.
While life under the sea still remains a mystery for many, there are some noteworthy breakthroughs. Case in point: a group of researchers from Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University recently recorded three new marine fish from the waters of Saint Martin's Island.
They are Cook's Cardinalfish (Scientific name: Ostorhinchus Cookii), Pinstripe Cardinalfish (Lepidamia kalosoma) and Twinbar Cardinalfish (Apogonichthyoides sialis). In Bangla, these fish are known as Duiddya mach, Dagi Duiddya mach and Dui Dagi Duiddya mach, in that order.
It took two years of extensive research conducted partly at the Aquatic Bioresource Research Laboratory (ABR Lab) of Department of Fisheries Biology and Genetics at Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University and partly at Saint Martin's Island to confirm this finding.
Three research assistants, Md Jayedul Islam, Najmun Nahar and Amit Kumer Neogi, led by Prof Dr Kazi Ahsan Habib of Sher-e-Bangla Agricultural University and closely aided by Thomas Henry Fresher, a fish taxonomist at the University of Florida in US, worked on this research from 2017 to 2019.
It was during their research work on DNA barcoding of coral and associated organisms in Saint Martin's Island that they chanced upon this information.
The species were identified and confirmed following analysis of their features and DNA barcoding. Not all the work went down in a lab though. The researchers collected photographic evidence of the species when they went scuba diving in the waters of Saint Martin's Island during the study period.
"Approximately over 750 species of marine fish have been recorded from the brackish and marine waters of Bangladesh. Species of fish are still being added to the existing fauna of Bangladesh and several new fish species were added into the countries fish checklist in the last few years."
"As researchers, we are constantly working to find unknown marine resources of the vast water bodies of Bangladesh," said Prof Habib.
The findings were published on August 23, 2021 in Russia's Journal of Ichthyology (springer publication).
According to the Eschmeyer's Catalogue of Fish (California Academy of Science), a total of 382 valid cardinal fish species have been identified in the world so far. At least 50 new marine fish, several crabs, shrimps and snails from the marine waters of Bangladesh have been added to the country's checklist in the last one decade, Prof Habib said.
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