Trophic relations of five common coastal fishes from the subtidal region, northern Chile (20 degrees 11'-20 degrees 20'S)

The trophic relations of five coastal Perciformes at northern Chile were an alyzed on the basis of 151 specimens of Acanthistius pictus, Paralabrax hum eralis, Pinguipes chilensis, Anisotremus scapularis and Cheilodactylus vari egatus collected off Iquique, in April 1996. as a preliminary way to identi fy trophic guilds of subtidal fishes; A. pictus, P. humeralis and C. varieg atus, had the crustaceans Rhynchocynetes typus, Pseudosquillopsis lessoni a nd Allopetrolisthes angulosus, respectively, as the best represented items. In A. scapularis and P. chilensis the best represented items were the moll usks; however for the last species, the main food was the crustacean Cancer setosus. These fish are essentially benthophagous carnivores with a variab le trophic spectrum (8 to 36 items).