First record of Mola ramsayi from the Sea of Oman, Sultanate of Oman laith jawad, juma al-mamry and lubna al-kharusi Marine Science and Fisheries Centre, Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries, PO Box 427, Postal Code 100, Muscat, Oman The first record of the southern ocean sunfish Mola ramsayi in Omani waters is reported based on a single 916 mm total length specimen found stranded on the coasts of Sur City 193 km south of the Omani capital Muscat, 22835 ′ 10.22 ′′ N 59830 ′ 18.91 ′′ E. This account also represents the third northernmost record of a south ocean sunfish in the Indian Ocean. Morphometric and meristic data are provided and compared with those of 5 specimens caught off United Arab Emirates, Brazil and India. The southern ocean distribution of M. ramsayi is corrected in this report. Keywords: Sea of Oman, Molidae, range extension, Oman, unusual record Submitted 9 December 2011; accepted 8 April 2012 INTRODUCTION Ocean sunfish or molas belong to the family Molidae. These species are epipelagic in nature (Matsuura, 2002). The molid species are characterized in having a distinctive laterally com- pressed shape and ‘chopped off’ appearance (Fraser-Brunner, 1951; Smith & Heemstra, 1986), using median fins for swim- ming, lacking caudal bones, ribs, pelvic fins, spines or girdles and have fewer vertebrae than any other fish (Tyler, 1980). The long history of the family Molidae goes back to the ear- liest descriptions by Linnaeus (1758) and by Koelreuter (1766) (see Parenti, 2003). Since then, 19 genera and 54 species of sunfish have been proposed (Parenti, 2003) and the taxonomy of the family has been relatively unstable. The most comprehen- sive taxonomic revision of the family is that of Fraser-Brunner (1951) in which he distinguished five species in three genera: R. laevis, Masturus lanceolatus, Masturus oxyuropterus, Mola mola and Mola ramsayi. At the present, there are four recog- nized species: R. laevis, Masturus lanceolatus, Mola mola and Mola ramsayi. The latter species is infrequently mentioned in taxonomic treatments (Smith & Heemstra, 1986; Nelson, 1994; Parenti, 2003). Morphological and molecular approaches were attempted to study the relationship among currently recog- nized genera. Santini & Tyler (2002) using morphological char- acters and Yamanoue et al. (2004) using molecular data found strong support for the conventional hypothesis of a sister taxon relationship between the genera Masturus and Mola, with Ranzania holding the basal position within the family. The known distribution of M. ramsayi is in the southern oceans, south-west Pacific: Australia and New Zealand, south- east Pacific: Chile and south-east Atlantic: South Africa. Al-Ghais (1994) recorded this species from the eastern coasts of the United Arab Emirates at the northern part of the Sea of Oman. That was the first record of this species from the northern hemisphere. Later, Mohan et al. (2006) recorded it from Chennai waters, India and it was the second appearance for this species in the northern hemi- sphere. In the present study, we recorded M. ramsayi for the first time from the Omani waters. This is the third record for this species from the northern hemisphere and the second for the Sea of Oman. RESULTS systematics MOLIDAE Mola ramsayi (Giglioli, 1883) material examined OMMSFC 1085, 916 mm total length (TL), 80 kg, 10 September 2011, coasts of City of Sur (N1384000 E4982000), found stranded on the coast (Figure 1). The fish was strange to the fishermen and their colleagues, who wanted to get rid of it, thinking that it was a ‘bad omen’. description Mola ramsayi differs from M. mola in the following set of characters given by Fraser-Brunner (1951): skin smooth with no denticles and no band of reduced denticles between dorsal and anal fins (Figure 2A) (in M. mola, skin rough with small denticles including a band of somewhat reduced denticles between the bases of the dorsal and anal fins); ossi- cles close together, much broader than spaces between them (Figure 2B–D) (in M. mola, ossicles widely separated, less broad than spaces between them); clavus supported by about 16 fin rays, of which 12 bear ossicles (Figure 2B) (in M. mola, clavus supported by about 12 fin rays, of which 8 or 9 bear ossicles). Morphometric and meristic details follow- ing Matsuura (2002) are given in Table 1. remarks Occurrence of sunfishes in the Arabian Gulf and the Sea of Oman are frequent in the past two decades. Ranzania laevis and Mola mola were recorded (Al-Baz et al., 1999; Jawad Corresponding author: L. Jawad Email: laith_jawad@hotmail.com 1 Marine Biodiversity Records, page 1 of 4. # Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom, 2012 doi:10.1017/S1755267212000462; Vol. 5; e63; 2012 Published online