fairy mullet

Open encyclopedia reference

Agonostomus telfairii is a species of ray-finned fish in the family Mugilidae, the mullets. It is known by the common name fairy mullet. It is native to the islands off the eastern coast of Africa, where it can be found in freshwater bodies and estuaries in Comoros, Madagascar, Mauritius, Mayotte, and Réunion. It returns to the sea to spawn.

This species grows to a length of 75 centimetres (30 in) TL and is of minor importance to commercial fisheries. The specific name honours the Irish botanist and ship's surgeon Charles Telfair (1778-1833), who is known to have made a botanical and zoological collection in Mauritius in 1810 which included the type of this species.

Wikipedia contributors, Agonostomus telfairii; see linked history · CC BY-SA 4.0 . Plain-text lead excerpt, at most 180 words; no infobox or later sections Retrieved 2026-10-05T02:57:10.021994+00:00. This reference remains separate from the taxonomic record.

Identity & source status

Scientific name

Agonostomus telfairii Bennett, 1832

Name authority

Bennett, 1832

Common name

fairy mullet

Rank

species

Accepted status

accepted

Kingdom

Animalia

Phylum

Chordata

Class

Teleostei

Order

Mugiliformes

Family

Mugilidae

Genus

Agonostomus

Extinction status

Not supplied by this source

Source habitat flags: Marine: yes · Freshwater: yes · Terrestrial: no. These do not form a complete habitat description.

Classification family tree

Nested taxonomic groups from the source. This is not a direct-ancestor chain, a dated evolutionary tree or a phylogenetic reconstruction.

1. domainEukaryota (Chatton, 1925) Whittaker & Margulis, 1978
2. kingdomAnimalia
3. phylumChordata
4. subphylumVertebrata
5. infraphylumGnathostomata
6. parvphylumOsteichthyes
7. gigaclassActinopterygii
8. superclassActinopteri
9. classTeleostei
10. orderMugiliformes
11. familyMugilidae Jarocki, 1822
12. genusAgonostomus Bennett, 1832
13. speciesAgonostomus telfairii Bennett, 1832

Close classified relatives

These entries share the source’s genus, Agonostomus. They are not necessarily the closest relatives established by molecular evidence.

Browse 65 records assigned to Mugilidae.

Names & synonyms

Names explicitly linked to this accepted taxon in the source. Synonymy can change with revision.

Source literature & publication evidence

References attached to this source record, including nomenclatural citations where supplied. This is a selected bibliography; abbreviated citations remain in the source’s form.

1. Bennett, E. T. (1832). Observations on a collection of fishes from the Mauritius, presented by Mr. Telfair, with characters of new genera and species. Proceedings of the Committee of Science and Correspondence of the Zoological Society of London, 1830–31 (pt 1): 165–169. Source fields: Taxon.tsv dwc:namePublishedIn, Taxon.tsv dcterms:references

Origins, evidence & remaining research

Name authority and publication references document nomenclature where the source supplies it. They do not establish evolutionary origins or the earliest fossil occurrence.

Specimen-level evidence, morphology, ecological research, phylogenetic studies, a comprehensive bibliography and a located literary passage have not yet been compiled for this record. A suitable sourced image remains to be added.

Dataset citation & attribution

This exact taxon in ChecklistBank · Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11

Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11; dataset 316321; doi:10.48580/dgz5n. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . Retrieved 5 October 2026.

Stable key: col:65SS7. Classification follows source parent identifiers. English common names may vary by region.