About Needlefishes and Flyingfishes
Surface-dwelling fishes with elongated bodies and often beak-like jaws.
Beloniformes are surface-dwelling fishes such as needlefishes, sauries, halfbeaks, and flyingfishes.
Morphology. Streamlined, often with the lower jaw or both jaws extended into a slender beak; pectoral fins are large in flyingfishes, enabling gliding flights above the waves. Scales are cycloid and often easily shed.
Habitat & distribution. Epipelagic (open surface waters) of warm oceans; flyingfish are abundant in the tropics and subtropical Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans.
Ecology. Fast pelagic planktivores and prey for tuna, dolphins, and seabirds; flyingfish escape predators by gliding.
