Maxwell Bernt

Largescale sucker.

First largescale sucker of the spring.

Photograph of a fossil fish skull in right lateral view. The bone is dark brown/black against a gray matrix.

Out now in Contributions from me and @gilespalaeo.bsky.social, a deep dive into an early member of the sturgeon and paddlefish lineage. Bear with me, but there’s a long backstory highlighting uncertainty about the anatomy of living species and how well-studied fossils can still yield new insights.

Just published: A very unusual fish, described here as a new genus and species of loach, and the first groundwater-dwelling fish reported from Northeast India. Meet 𝑮𝒊𝒕𝒄𝒉𝒂𝒌 𝒏𝒂𝒌𝒂𝒏𝒂! Open access article here: www.nature.com/articles/s41...

New in JFB: Alfaro huberi must have one of the strangest mating behaviors among poeciliid fishes. #TeamFish #FishSci

Paper: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/...
Corresponding video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKWA...

Our paper describing a new species of Pascua goby from the Coral Sea has been selected as en Editors Choice Article in Fishes. Apart from being fabulous, these fish are cool because they show that the genus has two groups of species separated by >5000km of the Pacific! www.mdpi.com/3483974 #fishes

Four incomplete fossil fish specimens on a black background. The specimens preserve scales, vertebrae, spines, and so on, and are dark gray on lighter gray to mustard-colored slabs.

Remarkable. Report of a Brazilian spiny-rayed fish dating to the Barremian stage of the Early Cretaceous, preceding the oldest known acanthomorphs by ~20 million years. Gondwanacanthus extends the roots of one of today's most prominent vertebrate radiations: onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

Dragon in the deep. 🐉⁠
⁠
Dragonfish (family Stomiidae) are cunning predators. Although they are strong swimmers, they prefer to lie in wait and ambush unsuspecting fishes and crustaceans. This black dragonfish (Idiacanthus sp.) was spotted at 527 meters (1,729 feet) in Monterey Bay.

From 1,750–2,000 m deep, we collected one of the rarest deepsea fishes out there: a one-jaw eel (family Monognathidae). Only ~100 specimens of this group are known worldwide and we hold the largest collection (~46), most just a few inches long… The one we collected though, 6 inches or 154 mm!

Black and white illustration of a skeleton of a herring with already some inclinations of the internal organs. The views are dorsal, lateral and ventral.

Not finished yet and this isn’t a pen and ink illustration, but a black and white rendition of a 3d model, but I love to share this herring. Except for some bones in the pectoral fins the skeleton is all but complete

A Shark Discovery ‘Didn’t Look Right.’ It Might Have Been a Plastic Toy. (Published 2023)

This record is a bit more convincing than the one they found off the coast of Greece a few years back: www.nytimes.com/2023/03/24/s...

Rare deep-sea shark seen for first time in Canary Island waters First-of-its kind sighting expands knowledge about elusive sharks , and underlines importance of the Canary Islands’ deep water habitats

#FishADay Mitsukurina owstoni Goblin Shark. Benthopelagic, mostly near continental slopes and seamounts. Known from < 250 captured individuals, so a recent well-documented recreational rod-and-reel capture (and release!) off the Canaries is very exciting.

oceanographicmagazine.com/news/rare-de...

A bustling seafloor scene from the #taleof2canyons expedition: “We studied how these canyons can facilitate such incredible biodiversity,” said Chief Scientist Dr. Silvia Ines Romero. “What are the mechanisms — the currents and the chemistry — that support all of this life?”

Two white-blooded fish, two paths: Icefish and noodlefish independently lose red blood cell function Antarctic icefish are famous for living without red blood cells, but they are not alone. A species of needle-shaped, warm-water fish called the Asian noodlefish also lacks hemoglobin and red blood cel...

phys.org/news/2026-01...

A view of a river at sunset. By combining many exposures I have multiple images for single birds flying through the scene, making the appearance of trails. One bird flies in an arc across the scene close to the camera and the sunlight can be seen shining through its tail feathers.

Homage to Xavier Bou: little swifts at the Olifants River high-water bridge, Kruger National Park. Unstacked from video taken with an Iphone 14. #birds #photography #SouthAfrica #iPhone

Whiteia anniae sp. nov. in right lateral view, Holotype (CHU 2016). (a), Whole specimen. (b), closeup of the calcified lung (indicated by lower arrows) and lateral line (indicated by upper arrows). (c), a scale near the head. (d), anterior tips of jaws with arrows indicating the fangs in anterior coronoids. (e), denticles on the last ray of the anterior dorsal fin.

New species of #coelacanth from the Early Triassic of China just dropped. Say hello to Whiteia anniae.🐟🧪 #FossilFriday

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Novel assembly of a head–trunk interface in the sister group of jawed vertebrates - Nature Imaging of a Devonian jawless fish reveals advanced features previously thought to be&nbsp;exclusive to jawed vertebrates, challenging the idea that jaws were the primary driver for the evolution of d...

A specimen of the fossil fish Norselaspis yields a wealth of information on the evolution of the head-trunk interface in vertebrates www.nature.com/articles/s41...

Wow--new goby fossil!!

Pennsylvania?

Alejandro Romero-Figueroa and Tiago P. Carvalho "Four New Species of Phenacogaster (Characiformes: Characidae) and a Review of Its Diversity in Colombia," Ichthyology & Herpetology 112(4), 619-644, (11 December 2024). https://doi.org/10.1643/i2023094

#NewSpeciesAlert - #𝑃ℎ𝑒𝑛𝑎𝑐𝑜𝑔𝑎𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑦𝑎𝑟𝑖, 𝑃. 𝑛𝑢𝑘𝑎𝑘, 𝑃. 𝑡𝑢𝑘𝑎𝑛𝑜 and 𝑃. 𝑔𝑢𝑎𝑦𝑢𝑝𝑒, four new species of #characins (#tetras) are described from the #Amazon and #Orinoco River basins of #Columbia.
🔒 bioone.org/journals/ich...
50-day free access - www.ichthyologyandherpetology.org/ihbjbd/tm202...

Sinocyclocheilus wanlanensis sp. nov., GXU2020000062, holotype, 86.74 mm SL. (A) Live specimen (not holotype); (B) lateral view of head in preserved specimen; (C) dorsal view of preserved specimen.

𝑆𝑖𝑛𝑜𝑐𝑦𝑐𝑙𝑜𝑐ℎ𝑒𝑖𝑙𝑢𝑠 𝑤𝑎𝑛𝑙𝑎𝑛𝑒𝑛𝑠𝑖𝑠, a new species of eyeless cavefish is described from Guizhou Province, China. 🐟🧪

mdpi.com/2076-2615/15...

While scanning some fishes yesterday I came across this Bonytail Chub collected near Blythe, CA in 1933. You can't find this species in Blythe anymore, nor in the rest of California as it is critically endangered. Museum collections like @nhm.org showcasing yet again our changing planet 🐟🐠

Panels c-f of Figure 1 depicting the lower jaw of Devonian actinopterygian Gogosardina coatesi

Curious about Devonian actinopterygian lower jaws? Look no further--our new paper provides comprehensive descriptions for 19 species in a tidy ~50 page summary! anatomypubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/...

In an unconscionable decision, the Smithsonian Institute has decided to no longer support the Biodiversity Heritage Library from 1 Jan 2026. Please someone step up and take it over.

New paper alert: 42 ecological traits for all 6,000+ valid species of #Neotropical_freshwater_fishes, the most diverse continental vertebrate fauna on Earth. A foundation for future studies on the ecology and conservation of tropical aquatic biodiversity.

nature.com/articles/s41...

a dragonfly perched on a hand wearing pink nailpolish

Do you fish in freshwater? Please share or/and complete our survey gathering data on observations of insects for our study on aquatic insect population declines! The link to our survey is here: www.surveymonkey.com/r/VXLMY89. Please share if you know anyone who might be interested in participating!

New fish paper! We found that Clinocottus globicpes eats anemones (weird!) using a novel wrestling behavior + strong jaws that likely started as adaptations for tearing algae. It also has thick skin that protects it from stinging cells. @jzoology.bsky.social 🐟🧪

DM for PDF.

doi.org/10.1111/jzo....

Six-inch yellow bullhead.

30-inch flathead catfish.

Yesterday was #NationalCatfishDay. To celebrate, I went fishing and used a catfish (Ameiurus natalis) as bait to catch a bigger catfish (Pylodictis olivaris). Not quite the monster I was hoping for...

Large, pale fish being lifted from moderately turbit water by a man in rain gear.

There are recent reports of the enigmatic Luciobrama macrocephalus from the Yangtze River...
This fish hasn't been collected since 1988.
From a facebook post by Drake Shaw: www.facebook.com/yuanzhou.xia...

Dude, I had the exact same experience at trivia with picking the fish round...easy to overthink fish questions when you're an ichthyologist.

Bathypterois guentheri from @schmidtocean.bsky.social dive 84 #MarineLife