Echeneidae

Distribution: Atlantic, Indian and Pacific. Elongate body, with the head flattened and bearing a sucking disc having 10-28 transverse movable lamina (disc said to have evolved from a spinous dorsal fin). Mandible jutted. Scales small and cycloid. Spines absent in dorsal and anal fins. About 18-40 soft rays each in dorsal and anal fins. No swim bladder. Branchiostegal rays 8-11. With the sucking disc, the remora hitches to larger animals such as sharks, bony fishes, turtles or mammals. Some species reportedly show considerable host specificity. About 1 m maximum length (reported for Echeines naucrates); the smallest species measuring 17 cm.