Photo: National Park Service, Fossil Butte National Monument
- Order
- Unknown
- Family
- Asineopidae
- Size
- About 31.1 cm / 12.3 in
The classic “mystery fish” — hard to place in any living order.
A. squamifrons is known as the “mystery fish” as it lacks identifiable traits to place it in an order. It was assigned its own family and has since been joined by Asineops sp. Asineops appears to have gone extinct in the middle Eocene.
A. squamifrons is characterized by short dorsal spines, rounded tail margin, tiny sharp teeth, and large mouth. It is known from isolated specimens and mass mortalities. It may be a primitive, spiny-rayed fish.
Species text: National Park Service, Fossil Butte National Monument — Fossil Fish Species.