Whitefin Sharksucker, Echeneis neucratoides
Whitefin Sharksucker, Echeneis neucratoides. Fish caught from coastal waters off Placida, Florida, February 2017. Length: 23 cm (9.2 inches). Catch, photograph and identification courtesy of George Brinkman, Guelph, Ontario, Canada.
Whitefin Sharksucker, Echeneis neucratoides. Fish caught from coastal waters off Key West, Florida, August 2014. Length: 43 cm (17 inches). Photograph courtesy of Dean Kimberly, Atlanta, Georgia.
Whitefin Sharksucker, Echeneis neucratoides. Fish caught from coastal waters off Broward County, Florida, August 2021. Length: 54 cm (21 inches). Catch, photograph and identification courtesy of Ben Cantrell, Sebastian, Florida.
The Whitefin Sharksucker, Echeneis neucratoides, is a member of the Remora or Echeneidae Family, and is known in Mexico as rémora filoblanco or simply and pega pega. Globally, there are two species in the genus Echeneis, both of which are found in Mexican waters, this fish found only in the Atlantic and one from both the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans.
The Whitefin Sharksucker has a long slim body that is 11 to 12 times longer than it is deep. They are a dark gray to grayish brown color with a dark belly. They have a broad darker brown or dark gray stripe with white edges on each side that extends from the jaw to the base of the caudal fin. The anal and dorsal fins are dark gray or black with white margins; their caudal fin is forked and has distinct white corners (for which they are named); their pectoral and pelvic fins are black with or without black edges. The lower jaw projects well beyond the upper jaw. Their anal and dorsal fins originate at mid body and taper to the base of the caudal fin; and, their pectoral fins are located high on the sides of the body with the upper margins overlapping the edge of the disc. Males cannot be easily differentiated from females. Their head has a convex lower and a flat upper profile with mid-sized black eyes and a modest sized disc that is 23% to 28% of standard length and reaches the just past the pectoral fin base with 16 to 28 lamellae.
The Whitefin Sharksucker is an oceanic pelagic fish that either travel attached to their hosts (large fish, dolphins, rays, sharks, turtles, whales and ships) or are free swimming over shallow coral reefs. They are poor swimmers and feed primarily on food scraps from their hosts as well as small crustaceans and parasite attached to the hosts skin. They are found from the surface to depths up to 46 m (150 feet) both inshore and off shore environments. They reach a maximum of 75 cm (2 feet 6 inches) in length. Reproduction is oviparous with external fertilization; the large spherical pelagic eggs are released enclosed in a hard case. The Whitefin Sharksucker is poorly studied and very little is known about their behavioral study. The Whitefin Sharksucker is poorly studied with very limited information available about their lifestyle and behavioral patterns including specific details on age, growth, longevity, movement patterns, diet, habitat use, and reproduction. They are difficult to study as they must remain in constant motion to survive.
The Whitefin Sharksucker is a resident of all Mexican waters of the Atlantic Ocean including the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean.
The Whitefin Sharksucker is an easy fish to identify due to its lamellae count and the stripes along its flank. It is, however, somewhat similar to the Sharksucker, Echeneis naucrates (narrow white caudal fin margins) and the Slender Suckerfish, Phtheirichthys lineatus (9 to 11 disc plates, narrow white bars on flanks).
From a conservation perspective the Whitefin Sharksucker is current listed as Data Deficient and has not been formally evaluated. They are seldom seen by humans and of limited interest to most.