[2] The colouration of this species is that it is iridescent dark blue dorsally and silvery-grey on the flanks and the underside.

[1] Pentaceros richardsoni is a species which is found around the globe in the temperate waters of the Oceans of the Southern Hemisphere.

It has been recorded from southern Australia, New Zealand and Cape Horn in Chile in the Pacific, off eastern South Africa in the Indian Ocean and the Western Cape and Tristan da Cunha in the Atlantic Ocean.

[4] Pentaceros richardsoni was first formally described in 1844 by the Scots surgeon, explorer, ethnologist and zoologist Andrew Smith (1797–1872) with the type locality given as Cape Point, South Africa.

[2] The specific name honours the naval surgeon, naturalist and arctic explorer Sir John Richardson.