Cigar wrasse
| Cigar wrasse | ||||||||||||
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Cigar wrasse in the Red Sea near Sharm El-Sheikh , a fire coral at the top right . |
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| Systematics | ||||||||||||
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| Scientific name of the genus | ||||||||||||
| Cheilio | ||||||||||||
| Lacépède , 1802 | ||||||||||||
| Scientific name of the species | ||||||||||||
| Cheilio inermis | ||||||||||||
| ( Forsskål , 1775) |
The cigar wrasse ( Cheilio inermis ) lives in the Indo-Pacific , from the Red Sea to southern Japan , to Hawaii , to Easter Island and south to Lord Howe Island .
features
The animal has an elongated, cylindrical body and is a maximum of 50 centimeters long. The average size of adult fish is 35 cm. Young animals have a brown or green camouflage pattern with a longitudinal stripe, which camouflages them well in algae fields and seagrass meadows. Adult fish are very variable in color and can be olive-green, red-brown, in rare cases bright yellow. Adult males may show a noticeable spot on the end of the pectoral fins that is yellow, orange, black, or whitish in color.
Way of life
Cigar wrasses live above seagrass meadows and algae-covered reefs at depths of one to 30 meters and feed predatory on hard-shelled, bottom-dwelling invertebrates such as crabs , mussels , snails and sea urchins . They live solitary, but gather in large groups to spawn.
literature
- Hans A. Baensch / Robert A. Patzner: Mergus Sea Water Atlas Volume 1 , Mergus-Verlag, Melle, 1997, ISBN 3-88244-110-0
- Dieter Eichler / Robert F. Myers: Korallenfische Zentraler Indopazifik , Jahr-Verlag GmbH & Co., 1997, ISBN 3-86132-225-0
Web links
- Cigar Wrasse on Fishbase.org (English)
- Cheilio inermis inthe IUCN 2013 Red List of Threatened Species . Posted by: Cheung, WWL, Sadovy, Y. & Liu, M., 2008. Retrieved February 8, 2014.