PNNL

Abstract

Here we present a re-description of Abudefduf luridus and reassign it to the genus Similiparma. We supplement traditional diagnoses and descriptions of this species with quantitative anatomical data collected from a family-wide geometric morphometric analysis of head morphology (44 species representing all 30 damselfish genera) and data from cranial micro-CT scans of fishes in the genus Similiparma. The use of geometric morphometric analyses (and other methods of shape analysis) permits detailed comparisons between the morphology of specific taxa and the anatomical diversity that has arisen in an entire lineage. This provides a particularly useful supplement to traditional description methods and we recommend the use of such techniques by systematists. Similiparma and its close relatives constitute a branch of the damselfish phylogenetic tree that predominantly inhabits rocky reefs in the Atlantic and Eastern Pacific, as opposed to the more commonly studied damselfishes that constitute a large portion of the ichthyofauna on all coral-reef communities.