Anchoa mitchilli is a species of ray-finned fish in the family Engraulidae, the anchovies. Its common names include bay anchovy and common anchovy.NatureServe. 2013. Anchoa mitchilli. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2013. Downloaded on 13 June 2016. It is native to the western Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico. It is one of the most common fish species along the coastlines of the western Atlantic.Newberger, T. A. and E. D. Houde. 1995. Population biology of bay anchovy Anchoa mitchilli in the mid Chesapeake Bay. Marine Ecology Progress Series 116 25-37.
No narrative description available for this taxon yet.
A DNA barcode is a short, standardised stretch of genes that works like a fingerprint — enough to tell one species from another. Below is the molecular trace Anchoa mitchilli has left across the world's sequence archives.
At a glance
DNA specimens43
BINs1
Marker genes2
eDNA detections142
Countries2
The DNA barcodethe species' typical barcode, built from every sequenced specimen
COI-5P652 bp consensus40 specimens
ACGT
▸ drag or hover over the strip to read any position — letter and how much it varies
Violet ticks below the strip = positions where individuals differ; flat = the species' unchanging signature. 99% of positions are identical in every specimen.
Where individuals differ — all 6 variable positions, in barcode order
Each circle is a barcode variant; bigger = more specimens, colour = region. Lines join the most similar variants and the tick marks count the mutations between them — a tight cluster is one “dialect”, a long line a more divergent lineage. Click a circle to list its actual specimens.
Diversity (π)0.36%
Haplotypes18
BIN1
Most divergent pair1.1%
N.America
Closest relatives by DNA barcode
The species whose COI barcode is most similar to this one — a quick “who is this most like”. The percentage is how much the barcode differs; it approximates, but is not, the full evolutionary tree.
★ the standard DNA barcode for this group — the short region actually read to tell this species apart. The rest are extra genes sequenced along the way.
★COI-5P12S
animal barcodemarker
Organelle genome
Besides the big genome in the nucleus, cells carry a small, circular loop of DNA inside the cell's energy factories — the mitochondria. It is inherited almost only from the mother and is a leftover from ancient bacteria that moved into the cell. The mitochondrial markers above (ND*, COX, CYTB…) are read from exactly this loop. Outer ring = one strand, inner ring = the other.
▸ Tap any coloured segment — or a gene chip — to see what it is
◖ violet arc = the COI-5P barcode — the ~650 bp read used to ID this species
Pick a coloured segment on the ring — or a gene chip — to read what that gene does.
protein-codingrRNAtRNA
07Deep time~10.1 Ma lineage
How far back this lineage goes — and how we know. Everything here is measured in Ma, short for “mega-annum”: millions of years ago. The chart reads left to right like a calendar of the Earth, from the deep past on the left to today at the right edgetop to bottom like a core drilled through the Earth, from the deep past at the top down to today at the bottom.
At a glance
DNA clock origin10.1 Ma TimeTree
When this lineage existed
How to read this: the coloured strip along the bottomdown the left is the geological calendar — the standard epochs (Pliocene, Pleistocene…) every museum uses, shown so you can see which chapter of Earth's history this lineage lived in. This lineage is a young one, so the strip is zoomed in to epochs — the finer subdivisions inside a period. The orange marker is the DNA clock: DNA accumulates mutations at a roughly steady rate, so comparing this species' DNA with its relatives estimates when the lineage split off — independently of any fossil.
DNA clock origin
08Occurrence & distribution
Record type342 342 records
Wild obs. + sensor331 668
Museum / vouchered10 169
Cultivated / captive1
Other504
Origin
Native475
Range
Area of Occupancy AOO29 176 km²
Depth
0–200 m sunlit27 815
200–1000 m twilight0
1–4 km midnight0
>4 km abyssal0
median 2.1 m · max 141 m · 27 815 records with depth
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
Coordinate accuracy100% within 1 km
≤100 m 43 420≤1 km 269 061≤10 km 49>10 km 74
312 604 georeferenced · 19 064 without coordinates
Open the mapobservation + sensor331 668
Museum / Voucheredphysical evidence
Backed by a physical specimen — a herbarium sheet, sample or voucher held in a collection. “Vouchered” means supported by material evidence, not just an observation.
Coordinate accuracy64% within 1 km
≤100 m 1 952≤1 km 772≤10 km 1 173>10 km 374
4 271 georeferenced · 5 898 without coordinates
Open the institutions mapphysical evidence10 169
Cultivated / Captivenot free-living
A living individual in a botanical garden, zoo or nursery — cultivated or kept, not free-living.
Coordinate accuracy
no georeferenced coordinates · 1 records without
Open the mapnot free-living1
Wildobservation + sensor
Human sightings and records, or camera-trap / sensor detections — someone (or a device) saw or captured the species in the wild.
10Collections & institutions
Holding institutions19 of 41 geolocated
Institutions and collections holding physical, vouchered specimens of this species — click a row to fly to it on the map.
Institution
Specimens
University of Texas Biodiversity Collections (UTBC)location not on record
1 996
Florida Museum of Natural History- Zoology, Paleontology & Paleobotanylocation not on record
1 254
North Carolina Museum of Natural Scienceslocation not on record
495
Texas Memorial Museum, Texas Natural History Collectionlocation not on record
405
Centro de Investigación y de Estudios Avanzados, Unidad Irapuato, Instituto Politécnico Nacionallocation not on record
176
Washington, US
161
University of Alabamalocation not on record
159
Texas Cooperative Wildlife Collectionlocation not on record
157
Louisiana State University, Museum of Zoologylocation not on record
154
Ciudad de México, MX
138
FishBaselocation not on record
98
New Haven, US
85
Southeastern Louisiana University, Vertebrate Museumlocation not on record
74
Montgomery, US
70
Ann Arbor, US
58
Mexico City, MX
40
Chicago, US
30
San Nicolás de los Garza, MX
29
Cambridge, US
22
Tapachula, MX
17
University of Minnesota, James Ford Bell Museum of Natural Historylocation not on record
16
Champaign, US
14
Wuzhou, CN
10
Ohio State University - Fish Division, Columbus, OH (OSUM)location not on record
8
CASlocation not on record
8
Toronto, CA
7
Florida State University Coastal and Marine Laboratorylocation not on record
6
Los Angeles, US
5
Museo civico La Terra e l'Uomo di Crocetta del Montellolocation not on record
3
Mexico City, MX
2
South Kensington, GB
2
Vancouver, CA
2
Oregon State Universitylocation not on record
2
Central Michigan University Museum of Cultural and Natural Historylocation not on record
1
ASUlocation not on record
1
Moore Laboratory of Zoology, Occidental Collegelocation not on record
1
Morelia, MX
1
University of California San Diegolocation not on record
1
ISUAlocation not on record
1
South African Institute for Aquatic Biodiversitylocation not on record
1
München, DE
1
41 institutions · 5 711 of 10 169 vouchered records shown · 76 without an institution code
Cultivated / Captivenot free-living
A living individual in a botanical garden, zoo or nursery — cultivated or kept, not free-living.
09Environmental DNA142 detections
Where the DNA of Anchoa mitchilli was picked up in samples of water, soil or air — nobody saw the organism, only its DNA left behind. A trace is a clue that the species was near, not a confirmed sighting.
Signal
Detections DNA found142
Studies independent surveys2
Countries2
Verifiable raw sequence linked68
Signal confidence: moderateweighed across independent studies, places & mapped detections
Where its DNA was found
0 of 142 detections have coordinates
Open the map2 countries0
Atlantic Ocean
How strong is each trace?
DNA read depthRead counts were not reported for this species — the map shows presence only, not how strong each trace was.
Modelled climatemodelled
−15°Ctemperature across detection sites+40°C
Temperature median16.4 °C 3.20–24.2
Seasonal swing summer↔winter20.5 °C
Max temp (day)19.1 °C 5.90–27.5
Min temp (night)15.2 °C 1.50–23.1
Precipitation87.4 mm/mo 46.4–113
Air humidity60.4 % 57.0–64.4
Vapour deficit751 Pa 333–1,176
Cloud cover40.9 % 30.3–52.1
CHELSA 1981–2010, ~9 km grid, at location & month of 139 detection points · median with p10–p90 · reflects where sampling happened, not only the true niche
How to read this: each dot is one detection of this species' DNA in an environmental sample. The confidence meter weighs how many independent studies and places back up the signal — one detection in one study is a hint; many across several studies is solid. Records dated before 2008 (when eDNA methods began) are treated as likely mislabeled and left off the map.
WikipediaWikimedia Foundation4 languages↗
BioWikiNetmultilingual Wikipediamultilingual↗
GBIFGlobal Biodiversity Information Facility170 808 records↗
OBISOcean Biodiversity Information System171 534 records↗
ENAEuropean Nucleotide Archive · EMBL-EBI142 eDNA detections↗
BOLD SystemsCentre for Biodiversity Genomics43 specimens↗
Open Tree of LifeOpenTreephylogeny backbone↗
WikidataWikimedia Foundationstructured facts↗
Catalogue of LifeCOLtaxonomy↗
GLoBIGlobal Biotic Interactionsbiotic interactions↗