Cryptacanthodes

Cryptacanthodes is a genus of marine ray-finned fishes belonging to the monogeneric family Cryptacanthodidae, commonly referred to as wrymouths. Three of the four species are found in the Pacific Ocean with one species native to the western Atlantic Ocean where they are benthic fishes, tunneling through soft substrates. It is currently the only known genus in its family.

==Taxonomy== Cryptacanthodes was first proposed as a monotypic genus in 1839 by the American physician and naturalist David Humphreys Storer when he described Cryptacanthodes maculatus from Boston Harbor on the Gulf of Maine in Massachusetts. The genus is the only genus in the family Cryptacanthodidae, which was named by Theodore Gill in 1861. The 5th edition of Fishes of the World classifies this family within the suborder Zoarcoidei, within the order Scorpaeniformes. Other authorities classify this family in the infraorder Zoarcales within the suborder Cottoidei of the Perciformes because removing the Scorpaeniformes from the Perciformes renders that taxon non monophyletic.