Orange-brown with a single white bar behind the head, in the magnificent sea anemone. Maldives, Sri Lanka and the Chagos only.
To about 11 cm, orange-brown with a single white bar behind the head and black edging on the fins. The single bar is the character — the other anemonefish in the region carry two or three. It is found in the Maldives, Sri Lanka and the Chagos and nowhere else.
It lives in the magnificent sea anemone and a few other large hosts, usually a breeding pair with several smaller non-breeders in the same anemone. As with every anemonefish, the mucus that stops it being stung is acquired rather than born: a juvenile settling on an anemone spends hours making brief contact before it can lie in the tentacles. It is bolder at the anemone than away from it, and a diver who waits rather than approaches will have it come out to inspect the port.
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.
