First Report of Fusilier Fish Family Caesionidae (Perciformes) from Northern Part of East Coast of India

The fishes of family Caesionidae are commonly known as fusilier and 21 species have been reported from this family (Holleman et al., 2013) throughout the world. They are associated mainly with coral reefs of tropical and subtropical areas. These reef inhabitants are usually schooling fishes and migrate from one reef to another through near shore soft bottom. This is the reason for which occasionally they were caught by trawl nets along with sardines, anchovies, and other pelagic species (Carpenter, 1988). In Indian waters 16 species of Caesionidae fishes were reported under four genera (Gopi and Mishra, 2015). During local survey around West Bengal coast the authors collected three species of Caesionidae and identified as Caesio caerulaurea Lacepede, 1801, Caesio xanthonota Bleeker, 1853 and Pterocaesio tessellata Carpenter, 1987. This paper reports all these three species and the family Caesionidae first time from West Bengal coast as well as Northern part of east coast of India.