Diamond lizardfish

Diamond lizardfish
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Actinopterygii
Order:	Aulopiformes
Family:	Synodontidae
Genus:	Synodus
Species:	S. synodus
Binomial name
Synodus synodus (Linnaeus, 1758)

The diamond lizardfish (Synodus synodus) is a species of lizardfish that lives mainly in the Eastern Atlantic Ocean.

Information

The diamond lizardfish is recorded to be found within a marine environment within a reef-associated area. This species lives generally in the depth range of 2 – 35 meters.^[1] They are native to the subtropical climate. The maximum recorded length of the diamond lizardfish as an unsexed male was about 33 centimeters or about 1.08 feet long. The common length of this species is about 20 centimeters or 7.87 inches. This species is commonly identified by the dark red stripes on its back. The diamond lizardfish is distributed and occupies the areas of Eastern Atlantic, Madeira, canary Islands, St. Helena Island, São Tomé Island, Western Atlantic, Florida, United States of America, southwestern Gulf of Mexico, Uruguay, Caribbean, Northwest Atlantic, and Canada. It is common to find the diamond lizardfish in shallow inshore waters. This species is known to prefer to stay on hard surfaces rather than sandy bottoms. It also can be found in reef areas and it also goes into open shelf water as deep as 90 meters. This species can be eaten and has been recorded to taste relatively good, but it is not commonly eaten. The diamond lizardfish is occasionally caught with artisanal gear used by humans.^[2] This species serves as no threat and to humans and it is harmless. ^[3] This species cannot be kept in an aquarium or traded for commercial usage. ^[4]

References

Notes

• Froese, Rainer and Pauly, Daniel, eds. (2012). "Synodus synodus" in FishBase. April 2012 version.