Dinopercidae: F III A2

Dinoperca petersi (Day, 1875)

Cavebass

Egg diameter in µm	Number of oil globules	Diameter of oil globule in µm	Yolk texture	Perivitelline space	Position of oil globule at hatch	Gut length   at eye- pigment stage	Myomeres
890-960	1	190-220	segmented	narrow	stern	47% of NL	24-25

Egg: The identifying features of this egg are size, segmented yolk and scattered white pigment spots on the yolk, but it differs from Acanthistius (FIIIA1), as the yellow pigment on the embryo is evenly spread (A & B), not in separate groups. The yellow pigment also occurs dorsally on the oil globule. When separating eggs into look-alikes, these are usually mixed with smaller eggs of LIIB5 and LIIIA5, as all three have yellow spots scattered across the yolk, but the segmented yolk serves to distinguish this egg. There are a few black pigment spots on the oil globule but none on the yolk. The oil globule is clear. Yolk segmentation is often confined to the edge. Incubation time is about 40 hours (23°C).

Larva: The early larva has yellow pigment in the finfolds, (C), but this has disappeared by day 4 (E). The dotted line of yellow pigment, dorsally on the notochord at 3 days, (D) is unusual. A 27 day juvenile is included here, as the dorsal and anal fin-counts (IX, 20; III, 14) are consistent with this species, and it was reared from a tank in which 8 FIIIA2 larvae were placed. C: NH, D: 3 days, E: 4 days, F: 27 days (23°C).

DNA barcoding has confirmed this species identification, with 9 hatched larvae ( 3 submitted under the code FIIIA2A), matching 7 locally collected adult fish (BOLD).

Eggs were found mostly from December to April (blue graph). The number of eggs per sample during each year is shown (white graph). The egg was not seen in the DHM samples.

Linked samples	Offshore	Inshore
Eggs	146	123
Hits	21	57

 In the Park Rynie linked samples, Dinoperca eggs were found almost equally in the offshore and inshore samples (54%), indicating they are shallow water spawners, in the 20-30m water depth range. See Section 7.3 and Table 1 of the Introductory Notes, for more information on the linked samples.