The ETYFish Project© Chr istopher Scharpf and Kenneth J. Lazara

comments: v. 5.0 - 26 Feb. 2020 Class ACTINOPTERIactino-, ray; pteron, fin or wing, i.e., fishes with fins of webbed skin supported by bony or horny spines (“rays”), as opposed to the fleshy, lobed fins that characterize Superclass Sarcopterygii

Subclass CHONDROSTEIchondros, cartilage; osteo, bone, being primarily cartilaginous fishes that show some ossification

Order ACIPENSERIFORMES 2 families · 6 genera · 32 species/subspecies

Family ACIPENSERIDAE Sturgeons 4 genera · 30 species/subspecies

Subfamily Acipenserinae

Acipenser Linnaeus 1758Latin for sturgeon, derived from akis, point; pente, five, referring to five rows of body scutes

Acipenser baerii baerii Brandt 1869 patronym not identified but probably in honor of Karl Ernst von Baer (1792-1876), Baltic-German Russian biologist

Acipenser baerii baicalensis Nikolskii 1896 -ensis, suffix denoting place: Lake Baikal, Siberia, type locality

Acipenser baerii stenorhynchus Nikolskii 1896 stenos, narrow; rhynchus, snout, referring to pointed snout compared to blunt snout of A. b. baerii

Acipenser brevirostrum Lesueur 1818 brevis, short; rostrum, nose, referring to shorter snout compared to A. oxyrinchus

Acipenser colchicus Marti 1940 -icus, belonging to: Colchis, ancient name for eastern coast of Black Sea in Eurasian Georgia, type locality

Acipenser dabryanus Duméril 1869 -anus, belonging to: Pierre Dabry de Thiersant (1826-1898), fish culturist, French counsel to China, and student of Chinese fishes, who collected type

Acipenser fulvescens Rafinesque 1817 fulvous, yellowish-brown; -escens, becoming, referring to olive-brown coloration on upper half of body

Acipenser gueldenstaedtii gueldenstaedtii Brandt & Ratzeburg 1833 in honor of Johann Anton Güldenstädt (1745-1781), Baltic-German naturalist and explorer, who identified this sturgeon in 1772 but used a non-Linnaean name (Sturio)

Acipenser gueldenstaedtii marsiglii Brandt 1833 in honor of Luigi Ferdinando Marsigli (1658-1730), Italian solider and naturalist, who identified this sturgeon in 1726 but used a pre-Linnaean name (Antaceus glaber)

Acipenser medirostris Ayres 1854 media, moderate or middle; rostris, snout, referring to size compared to specimens of A. transmontanus Ayres examined, all from San Francisco Bay, California, USA

Acipenser mikadoi Hilgendorf 1892 patronym not identified but likely in honor of the “mikado” or emperor of Japan (Hilgendorf lectured at Tokyo College of Medicine from 1873-1876 and described this sturgeon from one he saw at a fish market)

Acipenser naccarii Bonaparte 1836 in honor of philosopher, librarian and natural history professor Fortunato Luigi Naccari (1793-1860)

Acipenser nudiventris Lovetsky 1828 nudus, bare; ventris, belly, referring to seeming absence of ventral scutes, which are totally absorbed in large adults

Acipenser oxyrinchus oxyrinchus Mitchell 1815 oxy, sharp; rhynchus, snout, referring to sharply V-shaped snout

Acipenser oxyrinchus desotoi Vladykov 1955 in honor of Hernando (misspelled Fernando) de Soto (ca. 1496-1542), conquistador who explored the Gulf of

ACIPENSERIFORMES (Sturgeons and Paddlef ishes) · 1

Mexico and was first European to see the Mississippi River

Acipenser persicus Borodin 1897 Persian, referring to type locality in Caspian Sea, Iran

Acipenser ruthenus Linnaeus 1758 -us, adjectival suffix: from Ruthenia, historic name for Ukraine and/or Belarus, probably referring to distribution in eastern Europe

Acipenser schrenckii Brandt 1869 patronym not identified but almost certainly in honor of Leopold von Schrenck (1826-1894), Baltic German Russian zoologist, geographer and ethnographer

Acipenser sinensis Gray 1835 -ensis, suffix denoting place: Sinica (China), referring to distribution in Yangtze and Pearl River basins

Acipenser stellatus Pallas 1771 starry, referring to stellated marks and tubercles on head

Acipenser sturio Linnaeus 1758 Latin for sturgeon

Acipenser transmontanus Richardson 1836 trans-, over; montanus, mountains, i.e., found on western side of North America’s Continental Divide

Subfamily Scaphirhynchinae

Scaphirhynchus Heckel 1836scapho-, shovel; rhynchus, snout, referring to flat, shovel-shaped snout

Scaphirhynchus albus (Forbes & Richardson 1905) white, referring to pallid coloration

Scaphirhynchus platorhynchus (Rafinesque 1820)platy, broad; rhynchus, snout, referring to flat, shovel-shaped snout

Scaphirhynchus suttkusi Williams & Clemmer 1991 in honor of Royal D. Suttkus (1929-2009), noted authority on fishes of the southeastern USA and mentor to many ichthyologists

Subfamily Peudocaphirhynchinae

Pseudoscaphirhynchus Nikolskii 1900pseudo-, false, i.e., although this genus may superficially resemble Scaphirhynchus, and all three species previously assigned to it, such an appearance is false

Pseudoscaphirhynchus fedtschenkoi (Kessler 1872)in honor of Russian naturalist and explorer Alexei Pavlovich Fedtschenko (1844-1873), who collected type Pseudoscaphirhynchus hermanni (Kessler 1877)in honor of Hermann (forename not given), a ship officer (presumably on the Aralo-Caspian Expedition), who delivered sturgeon to zoologist and explorer Nikolai Severtsov (1827-1885), who coined the name in a presumably unpublished paper

The ETYFish Project · ACIPENSERIFORMES: Acipenser idae (Sturgeons) · 2

Scaphirhynchus suttkusi. From: Williams, J. D. and G. H. Clemmer. 1991. Scaphirhynchus suttkusi, a new sturgeon (Pisces: Acipenseridae) from the Mobile basin of Alabama and Mississippi.

Bulletin of the Alabama Museum of Natural History No. 10: 17-31.

Pseudoscaphirhynchus kaufmanni (Kessler 1877)in honor of “Lord” Kaufman for the “professional help” (translation) he gave zoologist Modest Nikolaevich Bogdanov, who named the sturgeon in 1874 but did not provide distinguishing features; “Lord” Kaufman is almost certainly Konstantin Petrovich von Kaufmann (1818-1882, also spelled Kaufman), first Governor-General of Turkestan, who commissioned the scientific exploration of the land after it became part of the Russian Empire in the 1860s

Subfamily Husinae

Huso Brandt & Ratzeburg 1833tautonymous with Acipenser huso; Medieval Latin and Old High German for sturgeon

Huso dauricus (Georgi 1775)-icus, belonging to: Daourie, obsolete term applied to area of central Asia southeast of Lake Baikal to about 120˚E, roughly the range of this sturgeon in Amur River basin of Russia and China

Huso huso (Linnaeus 1758) Medieval Latin and Old High German for sturgeon

Family POLYODONTIDAE PaddlefishesPolyodon Lacepède 1797poly, many; odon, tooth, referring to many teeth compared to no teeth in Acipenser [note: only juvenile Polyodon have teeth and type is a small specimen; name does not allude to numerous gill rakers as reported by many authors]

Polyodon spathula (Walbaum 1792)spatula, referring to paddle-shaped rostrum

Psephurus Günther 1873psephos, pebble; oura, tailed, allusion not evident, possibly referring to heavy dorsal caudal fulcra in adults

Psephurus gladius (Martens 1862)sword, referring to long sword-like rostrum [extinct due to overfishing and habitat loss, last seen alive in 2003]

3 · ACIPENSERIFORMES: Polyodont idae (Paddlef ishes) · The ETYFish Project

Illustration on which Walbaum based his account of Polyodon spathula. From: Mauduit, M. 1774. Sur quelques objets du Regne animal, apportés de la Louisiane. Observations sur la physique,

sur l’histoire naturelle et sur les arts 4 (11): 384-397, pl II.