Characterization of the lesser known Korean seerfish Scomberomorus koreanus (Kishinouye, 1915) (Scombriformes: Scombridae) in Indian waters

Abstract

AbstractScomberomorus koreanus was originally described from a single specimen from the west coast of Korea. In 1964 the species was synonymized with S. guttatus during the systematic review of the scombroid fishes of India. Subsequently, S. koreanus was discovered in Palk Bay in 1976, confirming its first record from India and the Indian Ocean. Since then, no such detailed taxonomic studies have been undertaken for the species along the Indian coast. Although the species is distributed in the Indo-West Pacific region and forms a commercially important fishery in part of its range, S. koreanus is poorly known and very limited taxonomic studies have been carried out in detail which usually results in misidentifications at field level. The present morpho-genetic investigation and previous molecular study by the authors confirmed the occurrence of the species in the coastal waters of both the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea. The exact characteristics of S. koreanus are detailed here, and their comparison was made here with the related species S. guttatus found in the northern part of the east coast of India, based on a thorough morphological study, including the radiographs of 13 fresh specimens (334–588 mm FL), colour photographs of S. koreanus collected in 2019–2021 and DNA barcoding.