A new short brown unpatterned moray eel Gymnothorax andamanensis (Muraenidae: Muraeninae) from Andaman waters, India

Abstract

Gymnothorax andamanensis sp. nov., a new short brown moray eel, is described here on the basis of two specimens collected from Port Mout, Port Blair, South Andaman (11.659327°N; 92.696148°E), caught using baited hand-lines in a sandy habitat at a depth of less than 2 m. The species is characterized in having the dorsal-fin origin before the gill opening, pre-anal length 2.1-2.2, jaw pores with black rim, two branchial pores, predorsal vertebrae 3, preanal vertebrae 57 and total vertebrae 135-136, teeth smooth, three large fang-like median intermaxillary teeth, biserial maxillary and uniserial vomerine teeth, and dentary teeth biserial with two teeth in each side in the second row of the dentary. The new species is compared with all 10 short brown unpatterned moray eels known from the world and two from Indian waters.