Hydrolagus

Hydrolagus Temporal range: Miocene–Recent PreꞒ Ꞓ O S D C P T J K Pg N
Hydrolagus colliei
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Chondrichthyes
Subclass:	Holocephali
Order:	Chimaeriformes
Family:	Chimaeridae
Genus:	Hydrolagus T. N. Gill, 1862
Type species
Chimaera colliei Lay & Bennett, 1839

Hydrolagus is a genus of fish in the family Chimaeridae found in the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans. ^[1]

Deep-sea chimaera photographed by the NOAAS Okeanos Explorer. Visible on its snout are tiny pores which lead to electroreceptor cells.

Species

The 22 recognized species in this genus are:

• Hydrolagus affinis (Brito Capello (pt), 1868) (small-eyed rabbitfish)
• Hydrolagus africanus (Gilchrist, 1922) (African chimaera) ^[2]
• Hydrolagus alberti Bigelow & Schroeder, 1951 (gulf chimaera)
• Hydrolagus alphus Quaranta, Didier, Long & Ebert, 2006 (whitespot ghost shark)
• Hydrolagus barbouri (Garman, 1908) (ninespot chimaera)
• Hydrolagus bemisi Didier, 2002 (pale ghostshark)
• Hydrolagus colliei (G. T. Lay & E. T. Bennett, 1839) (spotted ratfish)
• Hydrolagus eidolon D. S. Jordan & C. L. Hubbs, 1925 (Niji Chimaera) ^[3]
• Hydrolagus erithacus Walovich, Ebert & Kemper, 2017 (Robin's ghostshark) ^[4]
• Hydrolagus homonycteris Didier, 2008 (black ghostshark)
• Hydrolagus lusitanicus T. Moura, I. M. R. Figueiredo, Bordalo-Machado, A. C. Almeida & Serrano-Gordo, 2005 (Portuguese chimaera)
• Hydrolagus macrophthalmus F. de Buen, 1959 (bigeye chimaera)
• Hydrolagus marmoratus Didier, 2008 (marbled ghost shark)
• Hydrolagus matallanasi Soto & Vooren, 2004 (striped rabbitfish)
• Hydrolagus mccoskeri L. A. K. Barnett, Didier, Long & Ebert, 2006 (Galápagos ghostshark)
• Hydrolagus melanophasma K. C. James, Ebert, Long & Didier, 2009 (Eastern Pacific black ghostshark)
• Hydrolagus mirabilis (Collett, 1904) (large-eyed rabbitfish)
• Hydrolagus mitsukurii (D. S. Jordan & Snyder, 1904) (Mitsukuri's chimaera)
• Hydrolagus novaezealandiae (Fowler, 1911) (dark ghostshark)
• Hydrolagus pallidus Hardy & Stehmann, 1990 (pale chimaera)
• Hydrolagus purpurescens (C. H. Gilbert, 1905) (purple chimaera)
• Hydrolagus trolli Didier & Séret (fr), 2002 (abyssal ghostshark)

Fossil remains of the genus are known from the Miocene and Pliocene of California. ^[5]

References

1. Weigmann, S. (2016): Annotated checklist of the living sharks, batoids and chimaeras (Chondrichthyes) of the world, with a focus on biogeographical diversity. Journal of Fish Biology, 88 (3): 837-1037.
2. Walovich, K.A., Ebert, D.A., Long, D.J. & Didier, D.A. (2015): Redescription of Hydrolagus africanus (Gilchrist, 1922) (Chimaeriformes: Chimaeridae), with a review of southern African chimaeroids and a key to their identification. African Journal of Marine Science, 37 (2): 157-165.
3. "Niji Chimaera (Hydrolagus eidolon)". iNaturalist. Retrieved 2025-06-19.
4. Walovich, K.A., Ebert, D.A. & Kemper, J.M. (2017): Hydrolagus erithacus sp. nov. (Chimaeriformes: Chimaeridae), a new species of chimaerid from the southeastern Atlantic and southwestern Indian oceans. Zootaxa, 4226 (4): 509–520.
5. Popov, E. V., and G. T. Takeuchi. 2011. Miocene–early Pliocene chimaeroid fishes (Holocephali, Chimaeroidei) from California and a review of the global Neogene chimaeroid diversity and distribution. Journal of the Vertebrate Paleontology 31(Program and Abstracts):175.