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Thryssa malabarica, the Gautama thryssa or Malbar anchovy, is a species of amphidromous ray-finned fish in the family Engraulidae.[1] It is known as Balal parattaya - බළල් පරට්ටයා in Sri Lanka.

Malabar thryssa
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Actinopterygii
Order:	Clupeiformes
Family:	Engraulidae
Genus:	Thryssa
Species:	T. malabarica
Binomial name
Thryssa malabarica (Bloch, 1795)
Synonyms
Clupea malabaricus Bloch, 1795 Clupea malabarica Bloch, 1795 Thrissocles malabaricus (Bloch, 1795) Thryssa cuvieri (Swainson, 1839)

Description

It is distributed throughout the Indian Ocean of coast of India, Sri Lanka, and possibly Pakistan. It is a small schooling fish found in depth of 20-50m. Maximum length do not exceed 17.5 cm. The fish lack dorsal soft rays and only present 34 to 38 anal soft rays. There are 23 to 26 keeled scutes on belly. The characteristic feature to identify the fish is the presence of a dark blotch behind upper part of gill opening, and spots on cheeks and paired fins. Gill arches are pinky orange in color.

References

• IUCN Red List
• Anchovy

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