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Text or other creative content from this version of Fish reproduction was copied or moved into Ceratioidei. The former page's history now serves to provide attribution for that content in the latter page, and it must not be deleted as long as the latter page exists.
Text or other creative content from this version of Anglerfish was copied or moved into Ceratioidei. The former page's history now serves to provide attribution for that content in the latter page, and it must not be deleted as long as the latter page exists.
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Description: First paragraph on "Monophyly" would make more sense in 'Evolution' as it's about whether this is a clade. Same goes for the last paragraph on "Classification", which could go into 'Taxonomy'.
Makes sense, but these are physical traits that should be mentioned in the description section, and I believe it's important to immediately establish the traits that validate this group and are present throughout it. As a result, the first paragraph of the section establishes the general traits that define Ceratioidei. I moved the last paragraph as suggested. Anthropophoca (talk) 15:53, 16 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Then the paragraph is incorrectly worded and wandering off topic; a 'Description' should be focused on describing the appearance and structure, not on documenting monophyly which is no part of the description. We could say 'Ceratioids share characters of extreme sexual dimorphism ...', for example. Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:16, 18 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
I think if i were to rephrase it and discuss monophyly elsewhere it may lead to repetitive prose, so maybe a short explanation on what monophyly and diagnostic traits are in that section. Anthropophoca (talk) 03:24, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
The possible future overlap of a brief mention of monophyly with the introductory description of the group's main traits will probably pass over the heads of most readers, and is a small risk well worth taking; I'm sure we can keep it to a minimum.
We currently have evolutionary material in no fewer than four top-level chapters. Suggest that 'Evolution' should remain a top-level chapter, with 'Taxonomy' as a subsection and 'Phylogenies' (suggest we rename that to 'Phylogeny') as a second subsection. It would make sense to promote the last paragraph of 'Evolution' to a subsection (could be the first), 'Fossil history', so we get
3. Evolution
3.1 Fossil history
3.2 Phylogeny
3.3 Taxonomy
I've elected to retain the taxonomy section separately as there isn't much about the specifics of their speciation. Added the other two subsections. Anthropophoca (talk) 15:53, 16 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
The illicial apparatus of Ceratioids, evolved from a modified first dorsal fin, is notable as their esca contain bioluminescent bacteria, allowing them to produce light. This is ridiculously technical, especially at the start, while "of Ceratioids" is simply redundant (that's what this article is about). Suggest splitting it in two and rewriting. We only mention notable facts, no need to use the n-word. 'Esca' again is a singular (..."contains"). Wikilink dorsal fin, bioluminescent.
Suggested wikilinks are already there. Split sentence. "Contains" is in the simple present form of the word, indicating that living anglerfish are currently housing their glowing bacteria within their esca. Anthropophoca (talk) 15:53, 16 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Much the same for the next sentence An intricate system of musculature controls this apparatus, allowing fine control over the pterygiophore, illicium, and/or escal movement, .... Please rewrite in plain English; this is the first mention of the pterygiophore, and I doubt the word will mean anything to 99% of readers. A labelled diagram would definitely help here.
Males lack this apparatus entirely,[13] they instead possess a specialized structure used to attach to the females which is mainly composed of the denticular bones, which is formed through the fusion of modified dermal spinules on the front of the head; the pterygiophore is integrated into this system in some families. This is a 51-word sentence, with 6 clauses, two of which use the relative pronoun "which". Hemingway gives this a readability score of "Post-graduate" and a rating of "poor", warning that most adults are close to school grade 8 for reading. Please split it up and simplify it.
The first 3 paragraphs of 'Biology' lack subsection heading(s). These might be 'Behaviour', 'Life-cycle', and 'Bioluminescence'.
The second paragraph only discusses depth ranges and nothing else about the life cycle of these fish, and the larvae aren't very well studied so i can't beef it up. Added bioluminescence heading. Anthropophoca (talk) 15:53, 16 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Cryptopsaras couesii has apparently been observed to possess a form of camouflage known as "bioluminescent countershading" (otherwise known as counter-illumination).[34] This is a bit of a mouthful, if not going all round the houses to reach its point. Why not say something simple and comprehensible like "C. c. uses counter-illumination camouflage, producing light to match its background."? BTW [34] is available at https://oceanrep.geomar.de/id/eprint/34515/1/1417.pdf. I note that the paper is almost 50 years old, and that countershading and counter-illumination are not the same thing. One could use CI to give the effect of countershading, but saying that will confuse 99% of readers more than somewhat.
I honestly am somewhat confused by the source's assertions, so i'm just gonna summarize the sentence more. The paper's diagram and prose does imply counter illumination though, as the fish generates light and quote:"match[es] the overhead illumination perfectlly"). Anthropophoca (talk) 15:53, 16 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Now we have no mention of camouflage at all, and the paper is all about the use of bioluminescence to achieve camouflage. I agree with you that the diagram and prose are all about counter-illumination. The statement "adjusted the intensity of their luminescence to match the intensity of the overhead light" is effectively a definition of counter-illumination. We need to say so.
Unfortunately, the cited paper does not explicitly state "counter-illumination" so i imagine people are going to call it OR if i used the term. That's why i tried to use the roundabout explanation quoted at the beginning of this chain. Anthropophoca (talk) 09:07, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Then say something like 'camouflages itself by adjusting its bioluminescence to "match the overhead illumination perfectly"' (i.e. quoting the paper's text). That way at least we have the mechanism described. I suggest we then wikilink it.
No part of this GAN; if I find one I'll add it here so we can stop beating about the bush. Anyone who wants to work on the species article is welcome. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:42, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
The whole of the 'Reproduction' section is actually about 'Sexual parasitism', so suggest we rename it.
If a male is able to find mates and permanently associate with them (eventually leading to the development of fusion), then it is ultimately more likely to improve lifetime fitness relative to free living males, particularly when the prospect of finding future mates is poor; as an attached male is always available to the female for mating, he can potentially participate in multiple fertilization events, ensuring paternity for every such event where he is attached. is another giga-sentence (75 words!). Please split it up and simplify it.
which was surmised by Charles Tate Regan: The reason why ......(lengthy quotation) .......... into females. I'm not convinced we need any of the quotation, though the last bit about sex determination is interesting (even though wrong). It might be better just to paraphrase that last bit; the rest has actually already been paraphrased above the quotation so it's redundant.
I think it's interesting that one of the pioneer-specialists of this group had surmised the mechanisms of its reproduction a century ago, and i believe it's good historical context (like the group Pediculati currently discussed in Anglerfish). Perhaps the quote box could be minimized. Anthropophoca (talk) 15:53, 16 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
And I have now repeatedly said we can say so briefly, so let's do that please. What we don't need is massive weight with a quote box on the early theory: a brief mention in the text will be sufficient. Chiswick Chap (talk) 06:32, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Well the bulk of that passage is about Regan's deduction of the mechanisms behind the parasitism, which was made nearly a full century ago and is quite accurate. I feel it's not undue weight to give credit to someone's accurate theory. Anthropophoca (talk) 08:01, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
We do not require a 166-word quote box to say what is already paraphrased just above the box. We cannot use such long quotations for recent sources (copyright issues), and we should not use them in what is therefore inevitably an unbalanced way for the older, out-of-copyright sources: indeed this is the only quote box in the article, and an exceptionally long one at that. The existing paraphrase is probably sufficient, but if you want to extend it slightly, that'd be ok too. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:13, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Note [b]: is attached to "deep-sea anglerfishes" but seems to apply equally to "pelagic anglerfishes", and is uncited. Maybe we just do without it?
Pelagic anglerfishes is an unambiguous term and is what an expert decided on when titling his book/monograph on the matter. You know what "pelagic" means right? Anthropophoca (talk) 16:10, 16 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
I do (since you ask) but that's not the issue; the note is the problem.
If the sea toads, batfishes and goosefishes live "in the deep-sea", how is that not "pelagic"? The Pelagic zone extends down to the Bathypelagic and Abyssopelagic, which are certainly "deep sea", so your comment does not make sense with respect to your note. The note plainly applies both to "pelagic anglerfishes" and to "deep-sea anglerfishes", both phrases, so its attempt to separate pelagic from deep-sea fails, and my initial remark stands. Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:30, 18 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Ok so it appears you do not understand what a pelagic fish is; they by definition are distinct from benthic or demersal fish by living entirely within the water column and do not contact the bottom, as opposed to the ground fish which are "grounded". I suggest you read the Pietsch book. Anthropophoca (talk) 03:28, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Kindly do not attempt to personalise this: I am well aware of what benthic and demersal mean but they aren't in the footnote. The phrase "in the deep-sea" is at best ambiguous, and at worst seriously misleading. The footnote is unnecessary, and cited to [1] which does not say anything to support the footnote text: it just uses the name "deep-sea anglerfishes" without qualification as if it were perfectly correct, which makes the whole footnote Original Research. Suggest we delete it; if not, it must be rewritten and cited to a reliable source that actually supports it.
It is surmized that like many deep-sea fish, Ceratioids consume any prey they are able to capture, though due to small sample sizes and net contamination biases in these studies are likely. - something broken here.
All the images are from Commons and plausibly licensed.
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Not wholly convinced by the lead image, as it gives an impression of the diversity ... of Northeastern Brazil.
I guess it can stand but arguably a single image is not just sufficient but less misleading. The second image is actually a far better representation of the whole group's diversity.
I don't like how brown the preserved specimens are. I would use the picture of the type (Ceratias holboelli) but it's serving as the illustration for parasitism. Most of the other images that can replace it are line drawings or the ones with the violently blue backgrounds. Anthropophoca (talk) 16:27, 16 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Not ideal, but we are ... where we are.
The Linophryne arborifera image would ideally be replaced by a photo or painting (indeed, the Krøyer's angler fish image performs the function well).
It is a clear line drawing with labels. It also serves double duty as a depiction of the hyoid barbel, so i guess it just needs a longer caption explaining it. Anthropophoca (talk) 16:27, 16 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
A clear statement like "Done", as I advised at the start. "I guess it just needs a longer caption" doesn't say the job has been done, but that it would be nice if it were.
The Krøyer's angler fish image would be much improved by editing out the shadow of the flash apparatus used.
Captions "are known to float upside down" and "do not appear to exhibit strict prey choice" would benefit from editing (eg "are known to" is redundant; could say "are partially selective about prey", etc)
No, the indiscriminate use of galleries is deprecated; the use of small, specific groups of images, whether arranged using a 'multiple image' or a gallery is perfectly ok, because it's constructive and relevant. Rules are there to encourage good sense, it's their only purpose. Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:12, 18 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
The 'Aceratias macrorhinus' image is way too big, and should be renamed Linophryne indica. It is actually of the parasitic male fish, and needs to say so, or it looks totally irrelevant to the section it's in! We should also say (briefly) in the caption that the "denticular apparatus" is used to hook on to the female, enabling the male to fuse with the female and hence to be fed as a parasite.
Are you suggesting the caption is overlong? Even if i removed the beginning it would still be rather long, and it has pertinent information anyways, as "Reproduction" opens with males locate females through a combination of visual and olfactory means,..., and the relevant organs (enlarged eyes and/or noses) are discussed in body. Anthropophoca (talk) 03:38, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
The words above say the caption is fine but the image is too big. To save more of this, I've made the image "upright".
But the image area is reduced; the goal of image formatting is to have the area of every image about the same, whatever its aspect ratio (barring lead images and diagrams with small text). Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:37, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
The sources used are nearly all scientific and directly relevant.
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[7-10] are all chatty newsy sources, and all four of them are for the same fact. Maybe select one?
seems to have been actioned, the two BBC News 2006 sources remain.
The BBC articles are to depict the then-ongoing debate as to which fish was smaller. Either way i've added the record-keeping site as a citation. Anthropophoca (talk) 08:51, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
[1] USES CAPITALS where Title Case Would Do Better. Not sure we need to repeat the guy's name; we could use "|website=" instead of "|work=" and ditch the "|publisher=".
[13] is used with "rp" page numbers (and [2] sometimes). It's pretty messy injecting page numbers into the main text when all the rest of the refs (fortunately) don't. Suggest we use {{sfn|Pietsch|2009|p=29}}, etc.
[Munk 1964, Munk 1966] seem remarkably old; they're also solidly offline, and the actual page in each is not stated (the pp. seem to be total pages per book). Without actual page refs these aren't usable, and I'd need direct quotations for verification if they're to stay. For the single claim they're being used for, maybe replace them with something simpler?
[45] is a curious source (on the mitogenome) for its paragraph, but [25] is also present, please copy these refs to indicate which sentence is covered by which source;
From Cowles and Childress: M. johnsoni thus has a low metabolic rate even when compared to other fish species living at similar depths. In any case, i cited Pietsch's book again for good measure. Anthropophoca (talk) 08:59, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Please respond to each item individually: the single word "Done" would be perfect if you want to be brief. I will strike each item when completed. Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:32, 18 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
Well, we've struggled over the line somehow. I did find a later source that demonstrates that Young and Roper 1977 were talking about what later biologists call counterillumination, so that's sorted. Chiswick Chap (talk) 09:59, 19 May 2026 (UTC)Reply
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
