Exocoetidae

Exocoetidae

[‚ek·sə′sēd·ə‚dē]

(vertebrate zoology)

The halfbeaks, a family of actinopterygian fishes in the order Atheriniformes.

McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Scientific & Technical Terms, 6E, Copyright © 2003 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

The following article is from The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979). It might be outdated or ideologically biased.

Exocoetidae

 

(flying fish), a family of fish of the order Beloniformes. The body length reaches 45 cm. The pectoral fins are placed high on the body and are very long and broad—adaptations enabling the fish to glide above the water and escape from predatory fish. The exocoetids are capable of flying more than 100 m through the air and of reaching a height of 10 m; sometimes they land on the decks of ships. Thus, the pectoral fins serve as surfaces of flight. The organ of motion in the water is the caudal fin, which has an elongated lower lobe.

The family comprises six genera, which are primarily distributed in tropical and subtropical waters of the Atlantic, Indian, and Pacific oceans. In the USSR, the Cheilopogon heterurus sometimes appears in Peter the Great Bay in the summer months; the Exocoetus volitans is also encountered. The exocoetids feed on small plankton organisms and, in turn, serve as prey for many predatory fishes.

G. U. LINDBERG

The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition (1970-1979). © 2010 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.