Classification / Names Common names | Synonyms | Catalog of Fishes(genus, species) | ITIS | CoL | WoRMS | Cloffa

Teleostei (teleosts) > Ovalentaria/misc (Various families in series Ovalentaria) > Ambassidae (Asiatic glassfishes)
Etymology: Ambassis: Derived from Greek, anabasis = climbing up (Ref. 45335).
More on author: Lacepède.

Environment: milieu / climate zone / depth range / distribution range Ecology

Marine; freshwater; brackish; demersal; oceanodromous (Ref. 51243). Subtropical

Distribution Countries | FAO areas | Ecosystems | Occurrences | Point map | Introductions | Faunafri

Africa: Subtropical eastern South Africa to Kenya, Madagascar, Réunion and Mauritius (Ref. 50956).

Length at first maturity / Size / Weight / Age

Maturity: L_m 5.0 range ? - ? cm
Max length : 15.0 cm SL male/unsexed; (Ref. 52193)

Short description Identification keys | Morphology | Morphometrics

Dorsal spines (total): 8; Dorsal soft rays (total): 9 - 10; Anal spines: 3; Anal soft rays: 9 - 11. Diagnosis: Ambassis ambassis has the following combination of characters: a single supraorbital spine; rostral spine absent; preopercle ridge and rear margin serrate; interopercle edge smooth except for few small serrae at angle; 2-3 rows of cheek scales; predorsal scales 13-18; lateral line continuous (normally); lower gill rakers 19-23; pectoral-fin rays 14-15 (Ref. 50956).

Tolerant of freshwater when water temperature is within 7-32°C (Ref. 7248, 79840). Tends to be more tolerant of lower temperatures in water of low salinity (2ppt) than in seawater (Ref. 7248). Feeds at night on crustaceans, fish fry and larvae and insects (Ref. 7248). Salt dried and eaten in some countries (Ref. 12484)

Life cycle and mating behavior Maturity | Reproduction | Spawning | Eggs | Fecundity | Larvae

Main reference Upload your references | References | Coordinator | Collaborators

Fricke, R., 1999. Fishes of the Mascarene Islands (Réunion, Mauritius, Rodriguez): an annotated checklist, with descriptions of new species. Koeltz Scientific Books, Koenigstein, Theses Zoologicae, Vol. 31:759 p. (Ref. 33390)

IUCN Red List Status (Ref. 130435: Version 2024-1)

Least Concern (LC) ; Date assessed: 15 February 2017

CITES

Not Evaluated

CMS (Ref. 116361)

Not Evaluated

Threat to humans

Harmless

Human uses

FAO - Publication: search | FishSource |

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Trophic ecology
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Estimates based on models

Preferred temperature (Ref. 123201): 23.9 - 28.8, mean 27.3 °C (based on 254 cells).

Phylogenetic diversity index (Ref. 82804): PD₅₀ = 0.5000 [Uniqueness, from 0.5 = low to 2.0 = high].

Bayesian length-weight: a=0.01585 (0.00978 - 0.02569), b=2.98 (2.84 - 3.12), in cm total length, based on LWR estimates for this species & (Sub)family-body (Ref. 93245).

Trophic level (Ref. 69278): 3.7 ±0.56 se; based on food items.

Resilience (Ref. 120179): High, minimum population doubling time less than 15 months (Preliminary K or Fecundity.).

Fishing Vulnerability (Ref. 59153): Low vulnerability (10 of 100).

Ambassis ambassis (Lacepède, 1802)