Rock Croaker, Pareques viola

Rock Croaker, Pareques viola, Juvenile. Underwater photograph taken in Zihuantanejo Bay, Guerrero, December 2019. Photograph and identification courtesy of Maude Jette, Dive Zihuantanejo, www.Divezihuatanejo.com.

Rock Croaker, Pareques viola, Juvenile. Underwater photographs taken in Zihuantanejo Bay, Guerrero, March 2019. Photographs courtesy of Ron Woheau, Zihuantanejo.

Rock Croaker, Pareques viola, Juvenile. Underwater photographs taken in Zihuantanejo Bay, Guerrero, March 2018. Photographs courtesy of Ron Woheau, Zihuantanejo.

Rock Croaker, Pareques viola. Fish caught out from coastal waters off Mazatlán, Sinaloa, April 2013. Length: 12.7 cm (5.0 inches). Catch and photograph courtesy of Mike Ells, Big Rapids, Michigan. Identification courtesy of Dr. Ross Robertson, Smithsonian Institute, Panama.

Rock Croaker, Pareques viola. Fish provided by the commercial fishermen of Bahía Kino, Sonora, March 2015. Length: 15 cm (5.9 inches). Photograph courtesy of Maria Johnson, Prescott College Kino Bay Center, Kino Bay, Sonora. Identification courtesy of Dr. Ross Robertson, Smithsonian Institute, Panama.

Rock Croaker, Pareques viola. Fish caught out from coastal waters off Mazatlán, Sinaloa, October 2017. Length: 20 cm (7.9 inches). Catch, photograph and identification courtesy of Kenneth Tse, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Rock Croaker, Pareques viola. Fish  caught from coastal waters off Puerto Adolfo Lopez Mateos, Baja California Sur, May 2018. Length: 21.5 cm (8.5 inches).

The Rock Croaker, Pareques viola, is a member of the Croaker or Sciaenidae Family, that is also known as the Pacific Highhat and the Gungo Highhat and in Mexico as payasito gungo. A formal species has not yet been assigned to this fish by the scientific community since it is exceedingly rare and has not been fully documented. There are seven global members of the genus Pareques, of which five are found Mexican waters, three in the Atlantic and two in the Pacific Ocean.

The Rock Croaker has an oblong deeply compressed body. They have a uniform dark gray coloration with 4 to 7 dark stripes along their sides that fade fairly quickly post collection. Their fins are a uniform color without bars, spots or colored margins. Their head has an overhanging snout and a horizontal mouth. Their chin has 5 pores and no barbels. Their anal fin has 2 spines, with the second spine being thick and two-thirds the length of the first ray, and 7 or 8 rays and a short base; their caudal fin is bluntly rounded; their first dorsal fin has 7 or 8 bluntly pointed spines; their second dorsal fin has 1 spine and 42 to 45 rays and a long base; and, their pectoral fins are short. They have 19 to 23 short gill rakers. They are covered with rough scales.

The Rock Croaker is found within rocky habitats at depths between 11 m (35 feet) and 35 m (115 feet). They reach a maximum of 30 cm (12 inches) in length. The Rock Croaker is poorly studied with very limited information available about their lifestyle and behavioral patterns including specific details on age, growth, longevity, movement patterns, diet, habitat use, and reproduction.

The Rock Croaker is a resident of all Mexican waters of the Pacific Ocean with the exception that they are absent from Guerrero Negro, Baja California, northward along the central and northwest coasts of Baja.

The Rock Croaker is very similar in markings and shape with the Festive Drum, Pareques fuscovittatus (white boarders to the fins; deeper waters, different anal, dorsal and gill raker counts).

From a conservation perspective the Rock Croaker has not been formally evaluated. In in general they are  too rare and too small in stature to be of interest to most.