There are still parts of Earth that remain largely unexplored. Sometimes these areas are difficult to get to because of geography, or instability in the area, or sometimes it’s because nobody has thought to take a closer look. Beneath the waves off the coast of South Africa, a new species of pipehorse has been discovered, marking only the second-ever pipehorse species in the Cylix genus to exist anywhere in the world.
In 2021 the first pipehorse in the genus Cylix was documented swimming off the coast of New Zealand. Now this new species, named Cylix nkosi, was discovered in Sodwana Bay, KwaZulu-Natal, and marks the first record of the genus Cylix outside New Zealand.
Pipehorses belong to the family Syngnathidae which also includes seahorses, pipefish, seadragons, and pygmy pipehorses. All of these family members have common features like long snouts, male brooding, and features that help them camouflage in a marine environment. The species name given to the new discovery is “nkosi”, which refers to the protuberance on top of the pipehorse’s head, which the study authors say resembles a crown – nkosi, from the Nguni or Zulu language, means “chief”. These head spines and protuberances help the pipehorse blend in with the coral reefs it inhabits. The authors propose the common name Sodwana Pygmy Pipehorse for their new discovery.
Knowledge of this species actually began to stir in 2009 when a photograph was uploaded to the popular wildlife image-sharing platform iNaturalist under the mistaken identity of a seahorse genus. In 2017, however, the species was seen in the flesh at 2 Mile Reef and then later collected by the study authors at the same location in 2018. These were the female specimens, but the male was actually collected in 1987 from the Kosi River Mouth and identified in a collection at the South African Institute for Aquatic Biodiversity (SAIAB).
Comparing how the new species looked compared to the New Zealand species, as well as micro-CT scanning and genetic analysis, helped reveal the new species. It also revealed that the new species diverged from the New Zealand species approximately 8.3 million years ago.
The tiny male pipehorse measures only 46.6 millimeters (1.8 inches) in length, which may explain why they’ve remained undiscovered and unnamed to science for so long.
The paper is published in the journal Ichthyology & Herpetology.
