Ocean Sunfish References

SIZE RECORDS

Norman J. R. and F. C. Fraser, 1949, Field Book of Giant Fishes, G. P. Putnam and Sons, New York, New York.

Carwardine, M. 1995, The Guinness Book of Animal Records, Guinness Publishing, Middlesex, England.

A new world record...
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2003/05/0513_030513_sunfish.html

GENERAL INFO

Thys, Tierney. "Swimming Heads," Natural History (August 1994), 36-38. 

Eliot, John L. "Queerest Fish in the Sea? The Massive Mola." National Geographic (December 1994).

Norman J. R. and F. C. Fraser, 1949, Field Book of Giant Fishes, G. P. Putnam and Sons, New York, New York.

Australian museum
 http://www.amonline.net.au/fishes/fishfacts/fish/mola.htm

FishBase  
http://www.fishbase.org/Summary/SpeciesSummary.cfm?ID=1732&genusname=Mola&speciesname=mola

Ocean Sunfish Wikipedia entry
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_sunfish

Mike Johnson Marine Natural History Photography sunfish images and video
http://www.earthwindow.com

UK MOLAS

British marine life study society  
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/BMLSS/Sunfish.htm

Houghton JDR, Doyle TK, Davenport J & Hays GC (2006). The ocean sunfish Mola mola: insights into distribution, abundance and behaviour in the Irish & Celtic Seas. Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom. 86: 1-7.
 
TAGGING

T. M. Thys, B. W. Hobson, H. Dewar, 2000 Marine Animals: the Next Generation of Autonomous Underwater Vehicle

Tierney Thys, Ph.D., November 30, 2003 Tracking Ocean Sunfish, Mola mola with Pop-Up Satellite Archival Tags in California Waters

Note from the field 
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2001/02/0202_mola.html

Daniel P. Cartamil, Christopher G. Lowe, 2004, Diel movement patterns of ocean sunfish Mola mola off southern California; MEPS 266:245-253 (Also: http://www.int-res.com/abstracts/meps/v266/p245-253/ and http://www.csulb.edu/web/labs/sharklab/students/current/dan/flash/project_mola_pictures.html)

Inga Potter, 2007, Movement and Behavior of Ocean Sunfish, Mola mola, in the Northwest Atlantic Department of Zoology, University of New Hampshire, Durham, New Hampshire o: http://www.tunalab.unh.edu/molaresearch.htm)

USA MOLAS

Fulling, G.L., D. Fertl, K. Knight, and W. Hoggard. 2007. Distribution of Molidae in the northern Gulf of Mexico. Gulf and Caribbean Research 19(2):53-67.

Fitch, J, (1969) A second record of the slender mola, Ranzania laevis (Pennant), from California, Bull. So. Calif. Acad. Sci. 68(2): 115-118.

ASIA MOLAS

Adult Emperor angelfish (Pomacanthus imperator ) clean Giant sunfishes (Mola mola) at Nusa Lembongan, Indonesia, Coral Reefs (2006) 25: 208

PREDATORS

Gladstone, W. 1988, Killer whale feeding observed underwater, J. Mamm. 69 (3): 629-630.

DIVING

Harbison, G. R. and J. Janssen, 1987, Encounters with a swordfish (Xiphias gladius) and sharptail mola (Masturus lanceolatus) at depths greater than 600 meters, Copeia, 1987(2): 511-513.

HUSBANDRY

Keeping Molas in Captivity at the Monterey Bay Aquarium http://content.cdlib.org/xtf/view?docId=kt2g502035&chunk.id=ss1.87&toc.depth=1&toc.id=ch21 &brand=eschol

Monterey Bay Aquarium
 http://www.mbayaq.org/efc/living_species/default.asp?hOri=1&inhab=130

PARASITES

Milton S. Love and Mike Moser, Dec 1983, NOAA Technical Report NMFS SSRF-77 A Checklist of Parasites of California, Oregon and Washington Marine and Estuarine Fishes; pp.432-436.

Molidae Parasites

SPAWNING and MATURATION

Toshiyuki Nakatsubo, Masahiro Kawachi, Nobuhiro Mano and Hitomi Hirose, 2007, Aquaculture Science; Spawning Period of Ocean Sunfish Mola mola in Waters of the Eastern Kanto Region, Japan; 55（4），613－618

Toshiyuki Nakatsubo, Masahiro Kawachi, Nobuhiro Mano and Hitomi Hirose, 2007, Aquaculture Science; Estimation of Maturation in Wild and Captive Ocean Sunfish Mola mola; 55（2），259－264

Toshiyuki Nakatsubosan, A Study on the Reproductive Biology of ocean sunfish Mola mola (Dissertation)

National Geographic article on mola 
http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0211/resources_cre.html

EDIBILITY

Bartholomew, Ian, Taipei Times RESTAURANT REVIEW Sankokuighi - February 1, 2008

Saito, T, T. Noguchi, Y. Shida, T. Abe, K. Hashimoto, 1991, Screening of tetrodotoxin and its derivatives in puffer related species." Bull. Jap. Soc. Sci. Fish. 57 (8).

DEVELOPMENT

Schmidt, J., 1921, Contributions to the knowledge of the young of the sunfishes (Mola and Ranzania), Meddeleser Fra Kommissionen For Havundersogelser, 4(6): 1-13.

Sherman, K. 1961, Occurrence of early developmental stages of the oblong ocean sunfish Ranzania laevis (Pennant) in the central North Pacific. Copeia, 1961, 467-470.

Yabe, H. 1950, Juvenile of the pointed-tailed ocean sunfish, Masturus lanceolatus, Bull. Japan. Soc. Sci. Fish. 16:40-42.

BYCATCH

Silvani L., M. Gazo, A. Aguilar, 1999, Spanish driftnet fishing and incidental catches in the western Mediterranean, Biological Conservation, 90:79-85.

EVOLUTION

Santini F, Tyler JC (2002) Phylogeny of the ocean sunﬁshes (Molidae, Tetraodontiformes), a highly derived group of teleost ﬁshes. Ital J Zool 69:37–43.

Santini F, Tyler JC (2003) A phylogeny of the families of fossil and extant tetraodontiform ﬁshes (Acanthomorpha, Tetraodontiformes), Upper Cretaceous to recent. Zool J Linn Soc 139:565–617.

Tyler, J.C. and A. F. Bannikov, New Genus of Primitive Ocean Sunfish with Separate Premaxillae from the Eocene of Southwest Russia (Molidae, Tetraodontiformes), Copeia, 1992(4): 1014-1023.