Critical comments on the South Atlantic puzzle of reef fish biogeography [J.‐C. Joyeux, S.R. Floeter, C.E.L. Ferreira & J.L. Gasparini (2001) Biogeography of tropical reef fishes: the South Atlantic puzzle. Journal of Biogeography, 28, 831–841]

Even though biogeography deals with spatial and temporal scales that generally preclude experimental manipulation and formal hypothesis testing (Brown & Lomolino, 1998), there is limited room for speculations regarding the mechanisms responsible for the geographical and evolutionary patterns displayed by living organisms (Humphries & Parenti, 1984). Based on a selection of thirtyfive species (out of a pool of more than 1500 Atlantic reef fish species), Joyeux et al. (2001) stated that the South Atlantic reef fish biogeography proved to be an intricate tapestry , and tried to adjust a number of hypotheses in order to explain the puzzling distributions they found. Here, I propose to demonstrate that Joyeux et al. (2001) overstepped the limits imposed by currently available evidence, introducing a number of incorrect or unsubstantiated distributional and phylogenetic patterns into the literature. It has long been recognized that the Southwestern Atlantic harbours a considerable number of endemic species (Ekman, 1953; Briggs, 1974). In the late 1970s, as SCUBA diving began to be employed as a tool for collecting reef fishes along the Brazilian coast, it became evident that the number of endemic species was much greater than previously thought, as noted by Greenfield (1988). Several new species were discovered during these initial collecting efforts along the Brazilian coastal margin (Williams & Smart, 1983; Greenfield, 1988, 1989) and oceanic islands (Emery, 1972; Lubbock & Edwards, 1980, 1981; Edwards & Lubbock, 1981). The number of reef-associated species recognized as endemic to the South-western Atlantic has been steadily increasing in the last decade (e.g. Moura, 1995; Sazima et al., 1997, 1998; Rocha & Rosa, 1999), with no recent trend to stabilization (e.g. Burgess, 2001; Moura et al., 2001; Moura & Castro, 2002). Despite this considerable taxonomic progress, few works addressed the phylogenetic relationships within Pan-Atlantic groups that span multiple biogeographical provinces. The historical pathways underlying Briggs (1974) Atlantic faunal provinces have just started to be unveiled (e.g. Bernardi et al., 2000; Heiser et al., 2000; Muss et al., 2001; Rocha et al., 2002), and many questions still remain unanswered (Joyeux et al., 2001). A review of the literature, together with the examination of museum specimens and data from recent and comprehensive collections, reveals that most distribution patterns and phylogenetic relationships used by Joyeux et al. (2001) to conjecture about the puzzling biogeographical patterns in the South Atlantic represent either imperfections in their database or misinterpretation of recent literature. I argue that Joyeux et al. (2001) have introduced into the literature a considerable amount of erroneous data and added unnecessary explanations for each of the puzzling distribution patterns they found within a selected set of species. At the same time, these authors add few (or no) relevant data to the recent efforts for a better understanding of biogeographical patterns among Atlantic reef fishes (e.g. Moura et al., 1999a; Bernardi et al., 2000; Floeter & Gasparini, 2000; Heiser et al., 2000; Moura et al., 2001; Muss et al., 2001; Moura & Castro, 2002; Rocha et al., 2002).