Third Caribbean Bonefish Species Confirmed

June 30, 2008 By: Marshall Cutchin

“The new species can not be identified by physical appearance — only by examining DNA in the cell nucleus from bits of clipped dorsal fins. Geneticists at the Florida Fish and Wildlife Research Institute in St. Petersburg made the discovery recently based on samples taken from the Keys; the western, undeveloped side of Andros Island in the Bahamas; Mexico’s Yucatan region; the Virgin Islands; and Grand Bahama Island.” As Susan Cocking reports in the Miami Herald, genetic tests have identified a third species of bonefish in the Caribbean.