Least Concern Archives - Page 2 of 3 - Oceana

Guineafowl Puffer

The guineafowl puffer, like all puffers, has powerful jaws and beak-like teeth. The teeth of the upper jaw are fused into two tooth plates, as are the teeth in the lower jaw. In fact, the family name for puffers (Tetraodontidae) means “four teeth,” reflecting the two tooth plates that these fishes have in each jaw. Guineafowl puffers … Read more

French Angelfish

French angelfish are foragers and eat a variety of sessile invertebrates and plants, including sponges, algae, soft corals, tunicates, and others. Juveniles clean parasites and loose scales off of large fishes, including some that are predatory. French angelfish typically forage in pairs. In fact, they are almost always observed in pairs, which they form for mating and to … Read more

Common Dolphinfish

The common dolphinfish is an open ocean predator that eats small fishes, squids, and pelagic crustaceans. It is also an important prey species for sharks, billfishes, and other large predators. Therefore, much like the skipjack tuna, the common dolphinfish plays a vital intermediate role in open ocean food webs. The males are larger than females and reach lengths of … Read more

Bluebanded Goby

Bluebanded gobies are microcarnivores. They eat small crustaceans on the reef surface and from the water column directly above the reef surface. These gobies often hide near or under sea urchins (and the holes/hiding places that urchins create), and they do not like to stray far from these hiding places. They almost never leave direct contact with the … Read more

Swordfish

The swordfish’s bill differs from those of the other billfishes by being flat and blunt, rather than round and pointed. Like many open ocean bony fishes, swordfish start out as extremely tiny larvae, no more than a few millimeters long and weighing only a few hundredths of a gram. Soon after hatching, they already have a visible … Read more

Bluehead Wrasse

It gets its common name from the adult coloration, which includes an obviously blue head on an otherwise green body. Juveniles are solid yellow, or nearly so, with a black spot on the dorsal fin. The numerical success of the bluehead wrasse is apparent to anyone who has visited a Caribbean reef; it is one of the … Read more

Banded Butterflyfish

Though generally considered to be foraging predators, which lazily search the reef surface for food, Banded butterflyfish actually utilize a variety of feeding strategies. Some (often in pairs) do forage on the reef surface. Others form larger schools that visually hunt tiny plankton in the water column above the reef. Still others are known to engage in cleaning … Read more

Queen Parrotfish

Queen parrotfish are herbivores that graze the reef, using their beaks to scrape plants and algae from the reef surface. Oftentimes, this habit involves ingesting corals and other animals as well, but they are primarily herbivorous. Through their feeding strategies, parrotfishes create much of the sand around a reef. Upon eating some species of calcareous algae (i.e., … Read more

Peruvian Anchoveta

Peruvian anchoveta are filter feeders that rely, in some seasons, on microscopic algae (called diatoms) as their primary food source. During other times of the year, they rely more heavily on small, pelagic crustaceans. Though they filter very small prey, they use their relatively large eyes and exceptional eyesight to increase the density of prey in the … Read more

Pacific Sardine

Pacific sardines are filter feeders that feed on a variety of phytoplankton and zooplankton. Though they filter very small prey, they use their relatively large eyes and exceptional eyesight to increase the density of prey in the water that they filter. This strategy is in stark contrast to that used by the very large bodied filter feeders … Read more