View Full Version : Is a hoplias not an ancient fish?
rumblesushi
08-02-2005, 4:57 PM
The reason I ask is because full grown hoplias aimara's and macs remind me a bit of a coelacanth, which is the oldest living underwater creature right?
beblondie
08-02-2005, 5:37 PM
nope their not-Anne
Fruitbat
08-02-2005, 6:14 PM
Actually.....I suppose you could classify Hoplias and Erythrinus as 'ancient' fish. There is a widely held school of thought that these fish may be the most primitive extant taxon of the Characins (tetras and their relatives) and may be very similar to the ancestor from which the rest of the Characins are derived.
The Coelacanth (Latimeria and others) are representatives of a very old lineage of fish but whether they pre-date the lungfish is a matter for some debate. Bony fish of any sort, however, are certainly not the oldest underwater creatures. The Agnathans (lampreys and hagfishes) certainly pre-date the Coelacanth and the lungfishes and, of course, there are millions of different kinds of invertebrates that pre-date any fish!
-Joe
piranha45
08-02-2005, 6:35 PM
Coelocanths and wolf fish are not even in the same Class. And Class is an enormous distinction between individual fish species.
Fruitbat
08-02-2005, 8:15 PM
P45....
You're absolutely right....they're not in the same taxonomic Class....the Wolf Fish being in Class Actinopterygii (ray-finned fish) and the Coelacanth being in the Class Sarcopterygii (lobe-finned fish).
However, this does not mean that Hoplias can't be classified as a primitive example of the group of fish to which it belongs (Family Erythrinidae, Order Characiformes). General thought is that the African Hepsetidae and the South American Erythrinidae are Characins that exhibit the most primitive characters in the Order.
Certainly the Wolf Fish are not ancient in the mold of the lampreys, lungfishes or Coelacanth (or even the bichirs, for that matter).
piranha45
08-02-2005, 8:21 PM
i agree, i just wanted to drive home the point that aesthetic similarities don't indicate phylogenetic relationships, which is something the original poster seemed curious about
DRaGoNoVA
08-03-2005, 12:59 PM
well the wolfish looks cool anyway