A small barred bass with a long pointed snout, sitting on rubble and moving in short hops.
To about 12 cm. White above and yellow below, crossed by narrow black bars and stripes that break into irregular rectangles, with a long pointed snout and large black blotches on the lower head and throat. A black bar at the tail base and black spots in the middle of the tail.
The lantern bass is the confusion, and the throat is the separator: this fish has heavy black blotching on the lower head and throat, and the drawn-out snout to go with it.
Nought to forty metres on sand, rubble, reef edges and seagrass. Not shy. It is a simultaneous hermaphrodite, and it is monogamous in a specific and studied way — males are held to one female by the resources available rather than by preference. Pairs share overlapping home ranges without defending an exclusive territory.
FishBase gives a maximum of 29 cm for this fish, which is more than twice what every other source and every photograph supports. The smaller figure is used here.
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.
