New additions to black and white fish mutants

Abstract

In this short note we present unique and new records of a marine fish pigmentation abnormalities, including a case of an albino-melanistic fish, combining leucism and melanism, the first record of a leucistic individual of the iconic and critically endangered great hammerhead shark (Sphyrna mokarran), first record of leucistic Almaco jacks (Seriola rivoliana) and the first melanistic giant manta (Mobula birostris) in the north Atlantic. We speculate that these new records of pigmentary abnormalities may be related to significant population declines and isolation of remote populations.

Keywords

• Marine fish
• Albino-melanistic
• Leucism
• Melanism
• Pigmentation