The regional guide to this sea does not have this fish, and that is the most interesting thing about the card.
The global databases carry it without hesitation: an accepted name since 1972, thirteen centimeters, ten to forty-five meters, distributed through the 🌊 Indian Ocean. The book that covers this coast species by species, written by people who dive it, simply does not include it.
There are three ordinary explanations. It may be genuinely absent here and present in the wider 🌊 Indian Ocean, with our record resting on a range statement rather than a sighting. It may be here and so rarely seen that no photographer has caught one. Or it may have been seen and filed under one of its close relatives, which are numerous and similar.
All three are worth knowing, and none of them is settled by a database entry. A catalogue is only as good as the observations behind it, and an entry with no local photograph and no mention in the regional literature is a lead rather than a fact.
The fish, where it does occur, is dark with rows of fine pale dashes and lives on slopes below ten meters.
The species. Anampses lineatus Randall 1972 - lined. ETYFish
- dark body with rows of fine white to blue dashes forming broken lines
- yellow-orange on the tail base
- below ten meters, on slopes rather than reef top
- up to 13 cm
Why it's threatened
This species is exploited for the aquarium industry. Habitat degredation on coral reefs.
Threat classification from the IUCN Red List.
