A New Species of Photonectes from the Pacific Ocean off Oahu, Hawaii with a Revised Identification Key for the Genus (Teleostei: Stomiidae: Melanostomiinae)

Abstract

A new species of scaleless black dragonfish, Photonectes klepadloae, new species, is described on the basis of a single specimen collected in the central north Pacific Ocean off the Hawaiian Islands. The new species is readily distinguished from all congeners by the postorbital organ shifted forward to below eye, by the presence of the blue luminous tissue on the body arranged in two widely spaced interrupted lines between IV photophores and a streak-like patch on each side above 10th to 12th PV photophores, and by the structure of the mental barbel lacking a bulb, but having the long unpigmented distal appendage without a terminal swelling, and a pair of enlarged stalked photophore-like structures on the distal extremity of the stem. A revised key of the known species of Photonectes is presented.