Silver-grey with dark scale centres and a yellow rear body, in stationary schools around Galapagos and Cocos rock by day.
To about 50 cm. Deep and compressed with a small terminal mouth and thick fleshy lips. Silvery, with the large scales above the lateral line each carrying a dark centre so the flank reads as rows of spots, a yellowish rear third, and dark, grey or yellow fins.
This entry exists because of a 2021 revision. What was one species, Anisotremus interruptus, was split three ways: the Galapagos and Cocos Island fish became A. espinozai, which is this one; the Revillagigedo fish became A. perezponcedeleoni, which has its own page here; and A. interruptus now refers to the mainland fish, which occurs at none of this site’s destinations. The three were separated on measurements and counts, not on anything visible in the water, and no published character tells them apart by eye. In practice geography decides: at the Galapagos and Cocos this is the fish.
Three to ninety metres on inshore rock. Solitary and nocturnal, sheltering in crevices and caves by day and feeding on reef invertebrates at night. Juveniles school in late summer.
The published maximum sizes for the old combined species were 51 and 90 cm and neither can now be assigned confidently, so the figure above should be treated as provisional.
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.