Fig 1.
Circle: T. imperialis, Squere: Belone svetovidovi, Trigle: Belone belone.
Table 1.
Universal primers of COI and 12s rRNA gene regions.
Fig 2.
Morphometric measurements of needlefish.
TL: total length, FL: fork length, SL: standard length, PreD: Predorsal distance, PostD: Postdorsal distance, PreA: preanal distance, PostA: Postanal distance, PreV: preventral distance, HL: head length, 12-13: eye diameter, H: maximum body height, h: minimum body height, 3-4: dorsal fin base length, 8-9: anal fin base length, 14-15: pectoral fin length, 10-18: ventral fin length (Figure: Collette, [40]).
Table 2.
Haplotype number and its distribution between the species for COI gene region (Populations: NES: Nesebar, AKC: Akcakoca; RIZ: Rize; SIN: Sinop; YAL: Yalova, CAN: Çanakkale, IZM: Izmir, MUG: Muğla, ANT: Antalya, MER: Mersin, ISK: Iskenderun).
Fig 3.
Minimum spanning tree for the COI gene region, showing the evolutionary mutation relationships between haplotypes.
Table 3.
The lower part of the table is given for the COI gene region. In bold are the within-species genetic divergence matrix and pairwise genetic distances between species that are statistically significant for the COI gene region. The upper part of the table is for the 12s rRNA gene region. Intraspecific genetic divergence matrix in bold and italic letters and pairwise genetic distances between species that are statistically significant for the 12s rRNA gene region are given in italics (***; P < 0.001).
Fig 4.
Maximum Likelihood tree (ML) of needlefish species with reference samples for COI gene region.
Fig 5.
Maximum Parsimony tree (MP) of needlefish species with reference samples for COI gene region.
Table 4.
Haplotype number and its distribution between the species for 12s rRNA gene region (Populatios, AKC: Akcakoca; RIZ: Rize; SIN: Sinop; YAL: Yalova, CAN: Çanakkale, IZM: Izmir, MUG: Muğla, ANT: Antalya, MER: Mersin, ISK: Iskenderun).
Fig 6.
Minimum spanning tree for the 12s rRNA gene region, showing the evolutionary mutation relationships between haplotypes.
Fig 7.
Maximum Likelihood tree (ML) of needlefish species with reference samples for 12s rRNA gene region.
Fig 8.
Maximum Parsimony tree (MP) of needlefish species with reference samples for 12s rRNA gene region.
Table 5.
Relative relationships of measured body proportions of needlefish collected from Turkish Marine Waters and the Bulgarian coast. N: number of fish studied, MV: mean value, SD: Standard deviation, SE: Standard error of mean value; CV: coefficient of variation.
Table 6.
Meristic characteristic of needlefish. Dorsal fin ray number (DIS), Anal ray number (AIS), Pectoral fin ray number (PIS), Number of teeth, Number of gill spines, and Number of vertebrae were counted. In addition, data on the gonad status of each specimen were taken. N: number of fish studied, MV: mean value, SD: standard deviation, SE: standard error of mean value, CV: coefficient of variation.
Fig 9.
B. belone individual (a- B. belone’s general appearance, b- snout and head structure, c- dorsal, anus and caudal fin areas).
Fig 10.
B. svetovidovi individual (a- B. svetovidovi ‘s general appearance, b- snout and head structure, c- dorsal, anus and caudal fin areas).
Fig 11.
T. imperialis individual (a- T. imperialis’s general appearance, b- snout and head structure, c- dorsal, anus and caudal fin areas).
Fig 12.
The contribution of each morphometric character to the second and third principal components.
Fig 13.
Hierarchical canonical analysis of needlefish species.
Table 7.
The meristic features of B. belone and B. svetovidovi.
Table 8.
The meristic features of Tylosurus species.