South Pacific Studies Vol.36, No.1, 2015

Records of the Pughead Pipefish, Bulbonaricus brauni(Gasterosteiformes: Syngnathidae), from Amami-oshimaIsland, Central Ryukyu Archipelago, Southern Japan
Koeda Keita1* and Fujii Takuma2

1: the Kagoshima University Museum, 1-21-30 Korimoto, Kagoshima 890-0065, Japan
2: Research Center for the Pacific Islands Amami Station, Kagoshima University, 2-1
Naze-yanagimachi, Amami, Kagoshima 894-0032, Japan* Corresponding author
E-mail: hatampo@gmail.com

Abstract

Two specimens of the Pughead Pipefish, Bulbonaricus brauni, were collected from shallow
water of Amami-oshima island, central Ryukyu Archipelago, Japan. Previously B. brauni has beenrecorded in Japanese waters from the Yaeyama Islands, Okinawa-jima island, and the Ogasawara
Islands. Therefore the present specimens represented the first record from the Amami Islands, and thenorthernmost record of the species.
Key words: Amami Islands, Bulbonaricus brucei, Bulbonaricus davaoensis, distribution,
northernmost record, taxonomy

Introduction
Three species, Bulbonaricus brauni (Dawson and Allen 1978), B. brucei Dawson,1984, and B. davaoensis (Herald 1953), are currently placed in the genus Bulbonaricus, but
only the first is known from Japan (Dawson 1984, Suzuki et al. 2002, Senou 2013). Speciesof Bulbonaricus have the pug-nosed head, lack dorsal and pectoral fins, and are easily
distinguished from species of other genera (Dawson 1984).
During an ichthyofaunal survey at Amami-oshima island in the Amami Islands, twospecimens (female and male) of B. brauni were collected off southern part of the island ata depth of 15 m. The species, was previously recorded from off west coast of Sumatra inIndonesia, Western Australia, Palau, the Yaeyama Islands, Okinawa-jima island, and theOgasawara Islands (Senou 2013), with the northernmost record on the basis of voucher――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――――
Received: 26 May, 2015
Accepted: 25 June, 2015

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South Pacific Studies Vol.36, No.1, 2015

specimens reported from Iriomote-jima island in the Yaeyama Islands, southern Ryukyu
Archipelago, Japan. The present specimens are the first records of B. brauni from theAmami Islands and the northernmost records of the species.

Materials and Methods
Counts and measurements follow Dawson (1977, 1984). Measurements were madeto the nearest 0.1 mm with needle-point digital calipers under a dissecting microscope.
Standard and head lengths are abbreviated as SL and HL, respectively. The description
is based on present two specimens KAUM–I. 72148 and KAUM–I. 72147. Counts andmeasurements of KAUM–I. 72147 are shown in parentheses when data differ between
the two specimens. The specimens and underwater photographs of the two specimens aredeposited at the Kagoshima University Museum, Kagoshima, Japan (KAUM). Additionally,underwater photographs of B. brauni in Japanese waters examined in this study areregistered at the Image Database of Fishes in the Kanagawa Prefectural Museum of NaturalHistory, Odawara, Japan (KPM-NR). Curatorial procedures for the collected specimens
followed Motomura and Ishikawa (2013). Institutional abbreviations follow Eschmeyer(1998).

Results and Discussion
Bulbonaricus brauni (Dawson and Allen, 1978)
Standard Japanese name: Chin-yōjiuo
Figs. 1–4
Materials examined. KAUM–I. 72148, 50.4 mm SL, female, KAUM–I. 72147, 40.1mm SL, male, off Atetsu (28°10' 51'' N, 129°16' 56'' E), Setouchi, Amami-oshima island,Amami Islands, Kagoshima Prefecture, Japan, 15 m depth, 30 April 2015, T. FUJII.
Description. Caudal fin rays 10; 17 trunk rings + 46 (45) tail rings = 63 (62) totalrings. Head length 6.3 (6.7) % of SL; pre-anus length 30.1 (27.4) % of SL; trunk depth 3.1(2.7) % of SL; head width 29.5 (26.5) % of HL; snout length 8.9 (11.8) % of HL; orbital
diameter 13.3 (14.3) % of HL.
Body eel-like, slender and slightly compressed; superior trunk and tail ridgescontinuous; median trunk ridge straight, extending to 1st tail ring; ventral ridges on midventral line indistinct; all ridges on trunk and tail smooth; rings not distinct; no spines onhead and body rings; U-shaped concave at ventral surface of trunk. Head pug-nosed; frontal
process V-shaped, its dorsal margins denticulate and covered by fleshy wart; mouth inferior
with fleshy lips, located below pointed tip of projecting preorbital portion; gill opening
small, located at upper corner of gill cover. Dorsal, anal, and pectoral fins absent; caudal finsmall.

Koeda and Fujii: Records of the Pughead Pipefish from Amami-oshima Island35Fig. 1. Lateral, dorsal, ventral views (top to bottom) of Bulbonaricus brauni (KAUM–I. 72148), 50.4mm SL, female, off Atetsu, Setouchi, Amami-oshima island, Kagoshima Prefecture, Japan.

Fig. 2. Lateral view of Bulbonaricus brauni (KAUM–I. 72147), 40.1 mm SL, male, collected with
KAUM–I. 72148.

Fig. 3. Head and trunk of Bulbonaricus brauni (top: KAUM–I. 72148, 50.4 mm SL, female; bottom:KAUM–I. 72147, 40.1 mm SL, male), off Atetsu, Setouchi, Amami-oshima island, Kagoshima
Prefecture, Japan. Photographs of both specimens were shown at approximately 10-foldmagnifications.

Head, body, and caudal fin in fresh specimen red with numerous tiny white spots
uniformly distributed. Snout, preorbital portion, and lips solid white with no spots. Colorwhen alive same as freshly killed specimen.
Distribution. The species has currently been recorded from the following localities
in the eastern Indian and Pacific oceans on the basis of collected specimens, viz., Sumatra(Indonesia), North West Cape (Western Australia), Iwayama (=Nikko) Bay (Palau), GreenIsland (Taiwan), Iriomote-jima island in the Yaeyama Islands and Amami-oshima islandin the Amami Islands (Japan) (Dawson 1984, Suzuki et al. 2002, Ho and Lin 2014, thisstudy). Moreover the species has also been recorded by underwater photographs fromseveral localities in Japanese waters, including Ishigaki-jima island (KPM-NR 95966) in the36

South Pacific Studies Vol.36, No.1, 2015

Fig. 4. Bulbonaricus brauni (KAUM–I. 72148), 50.4 mm SL, female, in association with Galaxea
fascicularis, Amami-oshima island, Kagoshima Prefecture, Japan.

Yaeyama Islands, Okinawa-jima island (KPM-NR 97639), Chichi-jima island (KPM-NR97442) and Ani-jima island (KPM-NR 97447) in the Ogasawara Islands.
Habitat. Bulbonaricus brauni collected from Amami-oshima island lived among thecalyxes of Galaxea fascicularis with a colony size of approximately 0.3 m in diameter at
a depth of 15 m. Suzuki et al. (2002) reported that B. brauni inhabits among branches ofG. fascicularis with diameters ranging from 0.6 to 6 m at depths of 6-23 m in Iriomotejima island. The holotype (WAM P. 25800-001) of the species was collected among
dendrophylliid coral at a depth of 10 m, and the paratype (CAS 17789) was collected from G.
musicalis at a depth of 0.6-4.6 m (Dawson and Allen 1978).
Remarks. Characters of the present specimens are consistent with the diagnostic
characters of B. brauni given by Dawson and Allen (1978), Dawson (1984), and Suzuki
et al. (2002): i.e., frontal process V-shaped, its dorsal margins denticulateand covered byfleshy wart; trunk rings 17; and the head and body spotted. Bulbonaricus brauni is clearly
distinguishable from its two congeners by its spotted body without stripes (vs. longitudinalstripes without spots in B. brucei and B. davaoensis), 17-18 trunk rings (vs. 15-16 in B.
brucei), and the frontal process V-shaped (vs. rounded in B. davaoensis)(Dawson 1984).
Bulbonaricus brauni was originally described by Dawson and Allen (1978) on thebasis of two specimens from Western Australia and Palau. Yoshino (1990) firstly recorded
the species from Japan in the result of an ichthyofaunal survey of Iriomote-jima island.
Yoshino (1990) also proposed a provisional Japanese name “chin-yōjiuo” for B. brauni,
being now treated as the standard Japanese name.

Koeda and Fujii: Records of the Pughead Pipefish from Amami-oshima Island

37

The northernmost record of B. brauni based on collected specimens has previously
been presented from Kanokawa Bay (24°17' N, 123°43' E, KPM-NI 11786, 11787),
Iriomote-jima island in the Yaeyama Islands, southern Ryukyu Archipelago, Japan (Suzukiet al. 2002; see above). Senou (2013) indicated that underwater photographs of B. brauni
were taken from the Amami Islands, but the individuals were subsequently re-identified
as other species of Bulbonaricus (Senou personal communication). Therefore, the presentspecimens represented the first records of B. brauni from the Amami Islands, central Ryukyu
Archipelago, also being the northernmost record of the species (approximately a 700 km
north-west ward range extension).
Bulbonaricus brauni has been classified as ‘IUCN Red List, endangered species, Rank
IA’ in the Okinawa Prefecture, Japan (Yoshino 2012). The threat level rating is due to thelifecycle of the species being strongly associated with limited species of corals, and the factthat coral reef ecosystems have been and are still being damaged by mass coral bleachingand environmental destruction. However, the results of the present study suggest that B.
brauni is more widely distributed in Japanese waters than previously thought. In addition,
the colony size of G. fascicularis that B. brauni inhibits in the present study is smaller thanthose described by Suzuki et al. (2002), who stated that B. brauni inhabits G. fascicularislarger than 0.6 m in diameter. Our observations suggest that B. brauni can inhabit smallercoral colonies than previously believed. In order to more precisely define the level of thethreat to B. brauni, further surveys on the ecology and lifecycles of both the host corals and B.
brauni are required.

Acknowledgments
We are especially grateful to K. Hagiwara (Yokosuka City Museum), S. Yokoyama(Diver’s Guest House Orenchi), T. Shitamitsu (Tokyo University of Marine Science andTechnology), and D. Uyeno, T. Yoshida and S. Tashiro (Kagoshima University) for their
help in field collections and examination of specimens. We also thank H. Senou (KPM)
for the opportunity to examine underwater photographs. We thank T. Yoshino (OkinawaChurashima Foundation) for providing several references. H. Motomura (KAUM) gave
important advice on the manuscript. J. D. Reimer (University of the Ryukyus) improved
the English in the manuscript. This study was supported in part by a Grant-in-Aid fromthe Japan Society for the Promotion of Science for JSPS Fellows (PD: 26-477) to thefirst author, and the Program for Establishment of Research and Education Network on
Biodiversity and Its Conservation in the Satsunan Islands to the second author.

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