An Upper Cretaceous ichthyodectiform fish from Kyushu, Japan

An Upper Cretaceous ichthyodectiform fish from Kyushu, Japan

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Ichthyodectiform fishes are an exclusively extinct basal teleost clade, with a temporal range from the Middle Jurassic (Bathonian) to Upper Cretaceous (Maastrichtian).The fish fossils here described were found from Maeshima islet in Kumamoto, Kyushu, Japan in an outcrop of the Hinoshima Formation of the Lower SPICES Subgroup of the Himenoura Group.Although the material is constituted by parts of the head, the middle of the body, the caudal skeleton and fin of several individuals, all specimens belong to the same species due to the same features found in the bodies, vertebrae and scales.This species belongs to the order Ichthyodectiformes in having the elongate and laterally compressed body, the posteriorly situated dorsal fin and Saddle Stand uroneurals covering the lateral faces of ural centra and the first preuralcentrum.