Talk:Lungfish

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Initial discussion[edit]

This page as it currently stands reflects the accepted understanding of the position of the Dipnoi within the vertebrate order. Uninformed edits by people who can't be bothered to even parse sentences correctly will be quickly reverted. Abiola Lapite 22:56, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)


This page needs to be fixed. Your statement, lungfish are thought to have evolved from ray-finned fish is very poor. Lungfish as a unit could never have evolved from ray-finned fishes because lungfish are but one unit of sarcopterygii. One could replace lungfish in that sentence with coelacanth or even humans! Scythian99

Dude, it doesn't say "evolved", it says "diverged", which just means lungfish and rayfins have some older common ancester, and that they have developed along separate lines since then. "Diverged" is the most correct single word to describe the situation. Stan 05:37, 11 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
Here is the problem. It is not the lungfish that "diverged" from rayfins, it is the lobe-fins as a whole that "diverged" from them! I could say for the human article, that humans diverged from rayfins...so what is that saying, nothing! Also, that sentence implies that lobefins diverged from (meaning the source) the rayfins. What would be better to say is that lobe-fins and ray-fins diverged from X, not that one diverged from the other for clarity. Scythian99
Saying that "lobe-fins diverged" is a little more complicated, because then the reader has to know what "lobe-fins" are - they would have to stop reading this article and link to another one. The key point for the reader is to know that despite looking "fishy", lungfish are very different from the "usual" kinds; there are lots of ways to say this, some clearer to a wider range of readers than other, but all basically acceptable. In any case, I take it you understand this is a point of expository style, not of factual correctness? Stan 16:19, 11 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
Well, the article above all else should be accurate. Perhaps the first sentence should read that lungfish are a group of lobefinned "fishes"... Also, what do you mean by the "usual kinds", this is an encyclopedic article so language should be precise. By usual kinds I assume you mean rayfins or specifically teleosts? This article needs to be polled or be reviewed and edited by people who are experts in the field. The article is deceptive as is. I would like to edit it, but some scary sysops are out there who shouldn't be able to ban people who do not agree with them, whatever there agenda. Scythian99
Experts are handy, but since we base all our work on published literature, anybody who can read and understand that literature is capable of making the info just as accurate. If you're worried about editing the article, then propose a replacement text here, we can discuss, then apply it to the article. People get banned for starting fights and deliberately messing up articles, I don't think you have much to worry about if you can engage in rational discussion before deciding how to fix a problem. (By "usual kinds" I meant rayfins, but I double-quoted it to indicate I was talking about fish as understood by non-experts. We do have to be precise in articles, but at the same time accessible to someone whose fish knowledge may be limited to salmon steaks and goldfish in bowls.) Stan 05:50, 12 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
Here is my edit: Lungfishes are sarcopterygian (lobe-finned) fish that can breathe air (and in some species are obligate air-breathers), and have limb-like appendages instead of fins.

Although their taxonomy is still in flux; many put all of the lungfishes in the subclass Dipnoi. However, there seems to be agreement that there are two orders.

The information about ray-finned fishes (actinopterygian) is unnecessary in a a lungfish article. The article is about lungfish not sarcopterygian as a whole. Leave that information in the fish or sarcopterygian article. Does every article on individual species need such higher level classification disputes? Humans are sarcopterygian too... The article needs to be encyclopedic giving information that is based on a consensus from the experts. This information is NPOV. How can we put misinformation out? Who can take wikipedia serious with this kind of information! Scythian99

So let me get this straight: you're saying that the statement "Lungfish are generally believed to have diverged from the ray-finned fishes early in their evolutionary history" is factually incorrect and should be removed? Also, there is going to have to be some classification discussion, because lungfish have been reclassified several times; we need to inform readers that there are several different systems, so they don't attempt to "fix" the article with information from a 1909 textbook or something. Finally, repeated ranting about misinformation and wikipedia being taken seriously isn't going to make anybody do anything differently. Stan 13:21, 15 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, the statement: "Lungfish are generally believed to have diverged from the ray-finned fishes early in their evolutionary history" is factually incorrect! Lungfish are but one species of sarcopterygian (lobe-finned) fish that have evolved after the ray-finned and lobe-finned fishes already diverged from some common source! Do you understand? So how can lungfish diverged from ray-finned fished? This sentence is commiting a great fallacy in understanding evolution. Like I said I can replace "lungfish" with "human", "panda", "turtle", "frog", "coelacanth", etc. You can't say that one species in a larger family have diverged from another larger family. For example, synapsids diverged from reptiles early in their evolutionary history is correct, but humans diverged from reptiles early in their evolutionary history is incorrect! Also, lungfish internal classification may be in flux, but lungfish have always been considered sarcoptergyian. This is the classification that there is a consensus on. Stan, you need to ask some more people about this! This lungfish article is a joke and any evolutionary biologist would cringe. Scythian99
I understand perfectly what you're getting at - it's not exactly a complicated concept. But I suspect you lack fluency in English - "diverged" is a generic word that can be used in more ways than you seem to think. Take a look at the other uses of the word in Wikipedia, particular in the articles on evolutionary theory; you'll see that it's used to refer to a variety of situations. Ditto for the net at large. If you have an authoritative reference that formally restricts the term "divergence" to only refer to particular kinds of comparisons, I'd like to see it. Stan 06:10, 16 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, I am perfectly fluent in English, I am 26 and I have been speaking it for nearly 26 years. My argument is not with the term !!!"diverge"!!! which I know means to go in different directions from a common point. The concept of divergence in evolution also means something else, as with the divergence of the digits in whales, humans, birds, bats, and horses, etc. I don't think you see my point no matter how many times I have said it. So if you understand my simple concept, restate it so I know you understand. And if you understand this simple concept, why don't you change it in the article. Writing that lungfish have diverged from ray-finned fishes isn't saying anything than the obvious. I can put in any article on any species that they have diverged from ray-finned fishes. In the elephant article, I could write that elephants have diverged from ray-finned fishes. It is redundant, unnecessary information. Ok, I will state the problem once again. First, the article says lungfish early in their history diverged from ray-finned fish is a problem. What does that mean, early in their history??????? IMPORTANT: Before the species even became lungfishes they had already diverged from ray-finned fishes! I can't say lungfish anymore than elephants "early in their history" diverged from ray-finned fishes. It makes no sense. Is it "early in their history" as opposed to "later in their history"? This is sloppy careless writing. Do you even know the latest phylogenetic tree of Osteichthyes?:

I Actinopterygii (Ray-finned) II Sarcoptergygii (Lobe-finned) A Coelacanth B 1 Dipnoi (Lungfish) 2 Terrestrial Vertebrates

You don't seem to be able to grasp what I am getting at. I swear I will never get on wikipedia again, if there aren't any people who can understand what I am saying about this aweful sentence! Scythian99

First you say it's factually incorrect, now you're saying it's "obvious" but "sloppy careless writing". Does that mean you now no longer think it's factually incorrect? I'd certainly like to accommodate your concern, but it's hard to pick it out from the ranting. Stan 14:14, 16 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]
Well, now that I read it many times and pondered it, perhaps it is not factually incorrect, but I didn't like how they used the term diverged because it is misleading. Yes, one can use it that way, but an implied meaning is that lungfish diverged from actinoptergii and not sacrcopterygii. This is why I had a hissy fit. In any event, others need to look at the article and fix it because when I do some overzealous sysop bans my IP for a day (after reading his bio, he doesn't seem to be a qualified authority on lungfish or anything pertaining to evolution! Read between the lines here...). Ray-fins need not be mentioned in an lungfish article. Any knowledgeable person in animal classification would have a problem with that sentence and yes I am a qualified authority on the matter... Why don't you fix it Stan? Scythian99
I think I understand what to do now, will make a pass over the article. If this is an area where you have qualifications, why don't you make a user page and mention it there? Stan 22:28, 16 May 2004 (UTC)[reply]


This page reflects current understanding of lungfish biology and systematics as seen in the literature. The phylogenetics are from Schultze (2001) and Schultze (2004), and while those studies may be problematic, that needs to be addressed in a peer reviewed journal and not on Wikipedia. Uninformed edits will either be reverted or re-edited to maintain the scientific accuracy of this article. Many thanks. --Dlx2b 02:24, 16 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Alright, fixed some taxonomy issues and added a few references. --Dlx2b

minor problem[edit]

"Changes in physiology allow the lungfish to slow its metabolism to greater than 1/60th of the normal metabolic rate..."

Shouldn't this read "less than 1/60th"? Gary 05:02, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Lungs?[edit]

I am not sure what the rights and wrongs of this are, but discussion does not belong in the article itself so I am moving it here:

Lungfish do not have lungs but breath through external gills.
Not true: they have a basic lung (check out http://bio150.chass.utoronto.ca/animals/vertebrata.html)
That site requires auth... but here's another http://bill.srnr.arizona.edu/classes/182/Circ-1.htm —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.111.200.200 (talk) 01:04, 26 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

--DanielRigal 12:43, 27 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]


Yes, and I would add that most the African and South American lungfishes primarily use their gills to excrete waste. They can tolerate extremely muddy, anoxic conditions. See "The Biology and Evolution of Lungfishes", eds. Bemis, Burggren, and Kemp 1984.Biologistchica (talk) 19:56, 14 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Lungfish as food[edit]

Unlike many fish articles this does not mention its subject as food although a web search shows that they are eaten. That is not a great criticism of the article but the following method of catching them might be worth confirming. In the seasonally dried Tana delta in Kenya a hunter would stab a pole with a long metal spike into the ground and it was said that the groan given out revealed that a lungfish had been found.--SilasW 19:56, 26 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Lungs??[edit]

Huh. Currently the page doesn't mention lungs or gills. Seems like something of an oversight. The facts about the lungfish's occluding dental blades and fleshy pelvic fins are fascinating, but as a casual reader (and a non-biologist) I'm really here for the lungs (if any). Please help if you can! —Jorend (talk) 14:50, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

wow, you're right! what's up with that? i'm not a member of WikiProject Fishes, but i can certainly try dig up some pertinent sources. (but so can you, for that matter! i'm not a biologist either, fyi.) - Metanoid (talk, email) 18:40, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Taxonomy section[edit]

Hi, all. This is a work-in-progress using Template:Clade to form a better graphic representation of the taxonomy. However, the simple ASCII character diagram reproduced below from the article is very confusing. I have questions on the proper placement of the clades (e.g. is Order Lepidosireniformes really a daughter taxon of Family Neoceratodontidae?). Compounding the problem is my completely lack of knowledge in this area and lack of a reference for the taxonomy section. Any assistance in those areas? I'll gladly monkey around with the template below to make it fit right, but I'll need the input of an expert to guide the cladogram. Or if anyone wants to pick it up from where it is and tweak it until its right, that would be great, too. Cheers, Rkitko (talk) 02:22, 24 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

†Family Diabolichthyidae

†Family Uranolophidae

†Family Speonesydrionidae

†Family Dipnorhynchidae

†Family Stomiahykidae

†Family Chirodipteridae

†Family Holodontidae

†Family Dipteridae

†Family Fleurantiidae

†Family Rhynchodipteridae

†Family Phaneropleuridae

†Family Ctenodontidae

†Family Sagenodontidae

†Family Gnathorhizidae

Order Ceratodontiformes
Order Lepidosireniformes 


,--†Family Diabolichthyidae
| ,--†Family Uranolophidae
| |  __,--†Family Speonesydrionidae
'-|-|  '--†Family Dipnorhynchidae
    |     ,--†Family Stomiahykidae
    '----|___ ,--†Family Chirodipteridae
          |      '-|--†Family Holodontidae
          |------†Family Dipteridae
          |  __,--†Family Fleurantiidae
          '-|  '--†Family Rhynchodipteridae
              '--†Family Phaneropleuridae
                     | ,--†Family Ctenodontidae
                       '-| ,--†Family Sagenodontidae
                          '-|--†Family Gnathorhizidae
                             '--Order Ceratodontiformes
                                  |--†family Asiatoceratodontidae
                                  |--†Family Ptychoceratodontidae
                                  |--Family Ceratodontidae
                                  |  '--†Genus Ceratodus
                                  |  '--†Genus Metaceratodus
                                   '--Family Neoceratodontidae
                                        | '--†Genus Mioceratodus
                                        | '--Genus Neoceratodus - Queensland lungfish
                                        '--Order Lepidosireniformes
                                               '--Family Lepidosirenidae - South American lungfish 
                                               '--Family Protopteridae - African lungfish

Other air-breathing fish?[edit]

While this fish has been named "lungfish", there are a lot of other fish that breathe air and it is interesting to study this collection of fishes. Could this be the "salamanderfish" disambiguation, and have another page listing other fishes that have lungs. Or are all the others using gills? The walking catfish, the Siamese Fighting Fish, as well as most of the fishes that live in low-oxygen conditions like swamps. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.85.27.238 (talk) 20:42, 27 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Breathing through a gas bladder[edit]

Is anyone able to verify this stuff about breathing through a gas bladder? I understand the idea that the gas bladder performs gas exchange with the fish's blood, but that doesn't represent respiration for the purposes of maintaining metabolism. Does the gas bladder allow for diffusion of gases from the water outside the fish? I wouldn't have thought so. - Richard Cavell (talk) 06:19, 20 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Yep, just check any vertebrate biology or ichthyology textbook. In fact, lungs are the primitive state, with gas bladders representing a modification of the original lungs. In most basal fish (and several more derived fish), they can gulp air from the surface and push it into the gas bladder/lung, where it functions to oxygenate the blood that nourishes the heart. Coleen Farmer's 97 paper on this has more than enough details. Mokele (talk) 16:44, 20 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for your reply. Just to clarify, the gas bladder can perform gas exchange with the air gulped from the surface, but not with water? - Richard Cavell (talk) 22:04, 20 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Correct. African and South American lungfish (who have non-functional gills, at least as far as gas exchange goes) will actually drown if held underwater. Mokele (talk) 03:10, 21 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Okay. I believe you. But in that case, it's because the fish are respiring with their lungs, not with their gas bladders. Is there any creature that relies on gas exchange from the gas bladder, or for which the gas bladder contributes an appreciable percentage of gas exchange? (Note for amphibians, the skin is a significant site of gas exchange.)- Richard Cavell (talk) 09:23, 21 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Gas bladders *are* lungs, just modified. Back when it first arose, the first lung was just a balloon connected to the esophagus via a tube, and was used to take in air from the surface to nourish the heart (which is what's seen in modern gar and bichir). Its role of a buoyancy organ was secondary. Over time, some fish kept the primitive condition, others improved its function to allow better gas exchange (lungfish), others completely cut it off from the outside, using a specialized gas organ to fill the bladder from blood gasses (such as eels), while most oceanic fish (such as tuna) have lost it entirely (since it would be an impediment to changing depth). So it's all the same organ, it's just a relatively arbitrary classification of what name we use.Mokele (talk) 15:13, 21 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Lungs, gills and circulation diagram[edit]

Could someone please add a diagram to the sections on the perfusion of water and of air. These paragraphs are fascinating, and I think a diagram would help tremendously. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.197.5.59 (talk) 13:19, 29 May 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Longed-lived, but how long?[edit]

“The Queensland lungfish at the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago has been part of the permanent live collection since 1933" - this statement and its reference are not date-stamped. The fish might have died by now. AmirOnWiki (talk) 13:59, 20 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified[edit]

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Updated classification of Ceratodontiformes[edit]

I've redirected Ceratodontiformes to Lungfish as it looks like the two lungfish orders have been combined into Ceratodontiformes as listed on CoF. Lepidosireniformes is no longer recognized, and both Lepidosirenidae and Protopteridae are in a newly named suborder called Lepidosirenoidei according to DeepFin. Ceratodontiformes only refers to extant taxa and the most recent extinct taxa in subclass Dipnoi (now "Ceratodontae"), but I'm not sure how exactly Ceratodontiformes now fits into the cladogram. – Rhinopias (talk) 20:37, 28 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Pinging FunkMonk for noticing this needed to be updated a while back. – Rhinopias (talk) 20:39, 28 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Good move. Seems there are extinct species of the extant genera, by the way. FunkMonk (talk) 20:48, 28 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
I see extinct species in Protopterus, but are there any in Lepidosiren or Neoceratodus that aren't mentioned that would make those non-monotypic? Also, I suppose Neoceratodontidae is incorrectly redirected to Neoceratodus if Ceratodus and Metaceratodus are also in the family. I can attempt to start sorting out these pages and adding taxonomy templates. – Rhinopias (talk) 22:51, 28 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
Looking at Fossilworks, there seem to be some[1][2], but I'm not sure how up to date that is. FunkMonk (talk) 22:56, 28 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]
So, I was confused about whether or not to change this—removing Lepidosireniformes—because the secondary sources are in conflict. CoF doesn't acknowledge the order (in agreement with DeepFin, a primary source), but both FishBase and WoRMS recognize the order. Now I am more confused because I found this 2009 text that discusses suborder Lepidosirenoidei, but many recent publications still mention Lepidosireniformes… so I am not convinced this is really established yet? – Rhinopias (talk) 01:33, 17 October 2017 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified[edit]

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Critical of style[edit]

Is it possible for someone to re-write this in a form of English that the average Joe could understand? Having some zoological training I was able to read and comprehend but only with a deal of concentration to remember words heard many years ago at college and to interpret the style of professors who saw their job was to prove they were clever (which by inference said that you weren't). 75.162.89.171 (talk) 00:32, 7 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Zoology[edit]

Write a detail account of lung fish ? 103.57.168.3 (talk) 21:36, 18 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Please state what the etymology is the etymology of[edit]

The section Etymology reads as follows in its entirety:

"Modern Latin from the Greek δίπνοος (dipnoos) with two breathing structures, from δι- twice and πνοή breathing, breath."

This seems to have little to do with the title of the article: "Lungfish".

It is not hard to try to guess what this is intended to be the etymology of.

But an encyclopedia is not supposed to be a guessing game.

I hope someone knowledgeable about the subject will modify this section so that it states clearly and unambiguously exactly what it is describing the etymology of.

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