A rabbitfish covered in fine dark spots, and in this sea the head is black - a form found here and nowhere else, treated as a separate subspecies from the plain-headed animals of the wider 🌊 Indian Ocean. Up to 40 cm (16 in).
It goes in pairs, and the pairs are long-term. Two fish graze the same stretch of reef within a body length of each other, keeping watch in alternation, and a single rabbitfish is usually one that has lost its partner. Experiments on related species show one fish feeding while the other holds its head up scanning, then swapping - a division of attention that lets a grazer eat in the open.
Every fin spine carries venom. Thirteen dorsal, seven anal, two pelvic, all grooved and glandular, and a sting is severe enough to send fishermen to hospital. Hot water is the first aid, as with stonefish, because the toxin is protein.
It grazes algae off rock and dead coral all day, and the black head is the easiest thing to spot from a distance in a family that otherwise all looks alike.
- body densely covered in small dark spots on pale gray-brown
- black head in the Red Sea form, sharply cut off from the spotted body
- moves in pairs, one always a little behind the other
- length up to 40 cm
Why it's threatened
There are no known major threats to this species.
Threat classification from the IUCN Red List.
