Lutjanidae

Snappers are a family of perciform fish, Lutjanidae, mainly marine, but with some members inhabiting estuaries, feeding in fresh water. The family includes about 113 species. Some are important food fish. One of the best known is the red snapper.

Snappers inhabit tropical and subtropical regions of all oceans. They can grow to about 1 m (3.3 ft) in length. Most are active carnivores, feeding on crustaceans or other fish,[2] though a few are plankton-feeders. They can be kept in aquaria, but mostly grow too fast to be popular aquarium fish. Most species live at depths reaching 100 m (330 ft) near coral reefs, but some species are found up to 500 m (1,600 ft) deep.[2]

Five-lined snapper (Lutjanus quinquelineatus), northeast coast of Taiwan
Lutjanus vitta (brown striped snapper) sold at a supermarket

As other fish, snappers harbour parasites. A detailed study conducted in New Caledonia has shown that coral reef-associated snappers harbour about 9 species of parasites per fish species.[3]


Timeline

Quaternary Neogene Paleogene Holocene Pleist. Miocene Oligocene Eocene Paleocene Apsilus Quaternary Neogene Paleogene Holocene Pleist. Miocene Oligocene Eocene Paleocene

References

  1. Froese, Rainer, and Daniel Pauly, eds. (2013). "Lutjanidae" in FishBase. December 2013 version.
  2. 1 2 Bray, Dianne. "LUTJANIDAE". Fishes of Australia. Retrieved 29 September 2014.
  3. Justine, Jean-Lou; Beveridge, Ian; Boxshall, Geoffrey A; Bray, Rodney A; Miller, Terrence L; Moravec, František; Trilles, Jean-Paul; Whittington, Ian D (2012). "An annotated list of fish parasites (Isopoda, Copepoda, Monogenea, Digenea, Cestoda, Nematoda) collected from Snappers and Bream (Lutjanidae, Nemipteridae, Caesionidae) in New Caledonia confirms high parasite biodiversity on coral reef fish". Aquatic Biosystems. 8 (1): 22. doi:10.1186/2046-9063-8-22. ISSN 2046-9063. PMC 3507714Freely accessible. PMID 22947621.
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