The shortest life of any vertebrate on earth belongs to this genus. One dwarfgoby, measured on the Great Barrier Reef, lives fifty-nine days from hatching to death: three weeks adrift as larvae, a few weeks on the reef, breed, done. No backboned animal anywhere is known to turn over faster.
This species is one of the same set: three centimeters, translucent green, its bars visible through the body wall rather than painted on it, sitting on rubble and dead algae-covered reef within a few meters of shore. You can look straight at one and register nothing but a shadow on the rock.
Speed is the whole strategy. An animal that small is eaten constantly, so it grows fast, breeds early and often, and is replaced. The population is not a set of individuals so much as a standing flow.
The males carry a long filament off the first dorsal spine, which they raise at each other and at females, and which is the easiest thing to spot on an animal you can barely see.
The genus. Eviota Jenkins 1903 - ev- (Latinization). ETYFish
- translucent greenish body with six or seven dark bars showing through from inside
- red-brown speckling on the head, reddish scale edges
- black spot on the upper half of the tail base
- males with the first dorsal spine drawn out into a filament
- up to 3.1 cm
Why it's threatened
There are no known major threats.
Threat classification from the IUCN Red List.
