Bright yellow with blue stripes, in stationary schools around eastern Pacific rock.
To about 30 cm. Bright yellow with five blue-white stripes edged in black running the length of the body, a whitish belly with narrow grey lines, and mainly yellow fins.
The Panamic porkfish is the genuine field confusion here, because it is also yellow with blue stripes. The porkfish has two black bars on the head and nape and this fish has none. Against the yellow snapper, which shares the region and a blue line under the eye, look for the five black-edged stripes, which the yellow snapper does not have.
Nought to sixty metres, usually nine to fifteen, over rock and coral, and commonest at the offshore islands. It forms large tight near-stationary daytime aggregations, often hanging in the lee of a pinnacle, which makes it more reliably seen schooling by day than most snappers. It eats fish, mobile bottom crustaceans and cephalopods.
Ratings are per location: 1 means found on most dives that look for it, 5 means a handful of records. Where enough dives have been logged the figure is calculated from them; otherwise it is an editorial estimate, and says so. We publish habitat and destination, not the dive site.