CalCOFI.io CalCOFI.io open data ecosystem

Argyropelecus sladeni

Lowcrest hatchetfish

Speciesaccepted · checked 2026-08-05WoRMS 158837ITIS 162221GBIF 2347588key worms:158837
i

2026-08-05: itis_id 162221 via WoRMS external link

Argyropelecus sladeni, or Sladen's hatchetfish, is a species of ray-finned fish in the family Sternoptychidae, found in the tropical and subtropical Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans. This small fish lives in the mesopelagic zone by day and makes a daily vertical migration to the epipelagic zone at night.W CalCOFI holds 2,471 observations of it in 2 datasets between 1959 and 2023, as larva.R

2,471
observations
2,471
records
2,471
sampling events
1959–2023
years
2
datasets
larva
life stages
7 cm
max length
Argyropelecus sladeni
Photo · Unspecified, Texas A&M University at Galveston · CC BY 3.0 · commons

Observed in 2 datasets
i

One row per dataset, and beside it one cell per year, darker with more observations — the same strip the front door draws per dataset. Each row ends with the name that dataset uses (dataset_taxon); the accepted name is written once, in the title above. A quiet pill marks a name the authority does not accept.

  • 2,416 obs2,416 events1959–2023larva
    name used: Argyropelecus sladeni Lowcrest hatchetfish · code 105
  • 55 obs55 events2010–2012
    name used: Argyropelecus sladeni · code Argyropelecus sladeni

Ways inExplorerdb-queryERDDAPRPythonThis page as JSON

Code and endpoints ERDDAP · R · Python · JSON
ERDDAPCalCOFI's own server, the Ichthyoplankton table constrained to this taxon
https://erddap.calcofi.io/erddap/tabledap/swfsc_ichthyo.html?&taxon_key=%22worms:158837%22

Read from taxa.json of release v2026.10.20, written at release by calcofi4db::build_taxa_catalog(). The catalog's index is /species/.

How big is it 7 cm max · flexion 7.5–9.4 mm
Lowcrest hatchetfish7 cm
US quarter2.4 cm

max · worms_attribute

Every mark is a measured length with its own source — hover one to read it. The reference objects are _data/size_reference.csv: two of them, the 505 µm bongo mesh and the net's ring, are CalCOFI's own sampling gear.

Life stages larva
  • Ichthyoplankton larva

The stages each dataset records for it, from the release's obs_bio.life_stage. Their lengths are under How big is it.

Lineage 13 ranks · Biota to Argyropelecus
Credits silhouette · photo · text · length · plate
  • Silhouette · João Pedro Fernandes Moutinho · CC0 1.0 · PhyloPic, drawn from Argyropelecus olfersii · source
  • Photo · Unspecified, Texas A&M University at Galveston · CC BY 3.0 · commons · source
  • Text · Wikipedia, “Argyropelecus sladeni” · CC BY-SA 4.0 · revision 1344306181
  • Length · worms_attribute
  • Plate · Matarese, Kendall, Blood & Vinter 1989, NOAA Tech. Rep. NMFS 80, via the AFSC Ichthyoplankton Information System · Public domain (US Government work) · noaa_iis · source
Elsewhere Wikidata · iNaturalist · FishBase

WikidataiNaturalistFishBase

The same organism on the services the faces were fetched from; the authorities' own pages are the ids in the head.

Cite the release, v2026.10.20

Cite the release, v2026.10.20; each dataset's own citation, licence and DOI are on its page. How to cite ↗