Lutjanidae

Lutjanidae
Humpback red snapper, Lutjanus gibbus
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Actinopterygii
Order: Acanthuriformes
Family: Lutjanidae
T. N. Gill, 1861[1]
Subfamilies

see text

Lutjanidae or snappers are a family of perciform fish, mainly marine, but with some members inhabiting estuaries, feeding in fresh water. The family includes about 113 species. Some are important food fish. One of the best known is the red snapper.

Snappers inhabit tropical and subtropical regions of all oceans. Some snappers grow up to about 1 m (3.3 ft) in length, and one specific snapper, the cubera snapper, grows up to 1.52 m (5 ft 0 in) in length.[2] Most are active carnivores, feeding on crustaceans or other fish,[3] though a few are plankton-feeders. They can be kept in aquaria, but mostly grow too fast to be popular aquarium fish. Most species live at depths reaching 100 m (330 ft) near coral reefs, but some species are found up to 500 m (1,600 ft) deep.[3]

Five-lined snapper (Lutjanus quinquelineatus), northeast coast of Taiwan

As with other fish, snappers harbour parasites. A detailed study conducted in New Caledonia has shown that coral reef-associated snappers harbour about nine species of parasites per fish species.[4]

  1. ^ Richard van der Laan; William N. Eschmeyer & Ronald Fricke (2014). "Family-group names of Recent fishes". Zootaxa. 3882 (2): 001–230. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.3882.1.1. PMID 25543675.
  2. ^ "Cubera Snapper". blog.mountthis.net. Retrieved 2017-02-15.
  3. ^ a b Bray, Dianne. "LUTJANIDAE". Fishes of Australia. Archived from the original on 9 October 2014. Retrieved 29 September 2014.
  4. ^ Justine, Jean-Lou; Beveridge, Ian; Boxshall, Geoffrey A; Bray, Rodney A; Miller, Terrence L; Moravec, František; Trilles, Jean-Paul; Whittington, Ian D (2012). "An annotated list of fish parasites (Isopoda, Copepoda, Monogenea, Digenea, Cestoda, Nematoda) collected from Snappers and Bream (Lutjanidae, Nemipteridae, Caesionidae) in New Caledonia confirms high parasite biodiversity on coral reef fish". Aquatic Biosystems. 8 (1): 22. Bibcode:2012AqBio...8...22J. doi:10.1186/2046-9063-8-22. ISSN 2046-9063. PMC 3507714. PMID 22947621. Open access icon