Cheilopogon pinnatibarbatus

Cheilopogon pinnatibarbatus, Bennett's flying fish, is a species of flying fish which has a circumglobal distribution in tropical and subtropical seas.^[1] It is an epiplegaic species which feeds on zooplankton and small fishes and is capable of leaping out of the water and gliding over the surface.^[2]

Cheilopogon pinnatibarbatus
C. p. japonicus
1885 illustration
Conservation status
Least Concern  (IUCN 3.1)[1]
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Actinopterygii
Order:	Beloniformes
Family:	Exocoetidae
Genus:	Cheilopogon
Species:	C. pinnatibarbatus
Binomial name
Cheilopogon pinnatibarbatus (Bennett, 1831)
Synonyms[2]
Exocoetus pinnatibarbatus Bennett, 1831 Cypselurus pinnatibarbatus (Bennett, 1831) Cypselurus pulchellus Lowe, 1841 Exocoetus lineatus Valenciennes, 1847 Cypselurus lineatus (Valenciennes, 1847) Exocoetus orbignianus Valenciennes, 1847 Exocoetus robustus Günther, 1866 Exocoetus fernandezianus Philippi, 1895 Cypselurus minos Nichols & Breder, 1930

Subspecies

There are four subspecies of this widely distributed flying fish:

• Cheilopogon pinnatibarbatus pinnatibarbatus (Bennett, 1831) (Bennett's flyingfish) - Atlantic and western Indian Ocean
• Cheilopogon pinnatibarbatus californicus (J. G. Cooper, 1863) (California flyingfish) - Eastern Pacific Ocean, from Oregon to Baja California
• Cheilopogon pinnatibarbatus japonicus (V. Franz, 1910) - north western Pacific Ocean, around Japan
• Cheilopogon pinnatibarbatus melanocercus (J. D. Ogilby, 1885) (Australasian flying fish) - southwestern Pacific, eastern Australia and New Zealand