New Damsel (at least to me)- and it is a ????

[Puffer Fish]

Sunday on a reef called Whitehall, off of Destin Florida, can across this guy:

Clearly a Juvenal (ok, maybe not, but is not very big), but the color is unlike any of the standard Damsel's we have here...

My first thought was a bicolor, but Stegastes partitus here are very different colored, with a very white back half...

 

[Rick Murchison]

I believe that's a Beaugregory, very common in that area.
Rick

 

[Papa_Bear]

And the wider Caribbean, this variety one is from Bonaire:

 

[Puffer Fish]

I believe that's a Beaugregory, very common in that area.
Rick

Nice try Rick, but we don't have Beaugregory's here....they are dusky's... miss id'ed as Beaugregory's (thanks to several people far more competent than I am).. but this is not a dusky - well not as I know them.

The length, by the way, is just under 1 inch....so if any of the standard Damsel's, that would be a very young one.

Also, notice the pointed fins at their back....and the blue line on the bottom fin..

 

[deborahdelamar]

Puffer - That's the adult phase of the Cocoa. You can't go by color alone! Note the distinct vertical lines of its scale pattern. (We've discussed this before... The Beau's scales look more cross-hatched.)

Papa Bear's Damsel is a Threespot.

 

[Rick Murchison]

Ahhhh.... the problem is that in the Northern Gulf, according to Shipp's Fishes of the Gulf of Mexico, the local common name for the Cocoa Damsel is the Beaugregory, and they are common.
Rick

 

[deborahdelamar]

Now I understand why there's so much confusion -- not that the two are easy to tell apart in the first place. The ID's have been difficult to pin down for years. Both species have similar coloration. As I told Puffer, until 2008, it was assumed that the Cocoa was the one with the dot on its tail and the Beau had none. But the fish weren't consistent and the "Cocoa Puff" dot was rejected as a reliable ID clue.

Now the ID is based primarily on scale pattern -- the Cocoa's scales are edged in black and make a neat, lined pattern; whereas the Beau's don't. There's also a slight difference in the snout, with the Beau's being more concave above the lips, but that's hard to tell in the wild. It seems in both fish that the dorsal fin starts pointy at the back and rounds out as the fish ages -- that's interesting to me, anyway.

 

[Rick Murchison]

It's the "common name conundrum." They can vary widely, and in small areas. Get a guy from Perdido Bay and another from Panama City into a discussion about "pinfish" and watch the fur fly!
Rick

 

[Puffer Fish]

Puffer - That's the adult phase of the Cocoa. You can't go by color alone! Note the distinct vertical lines of its scale pattern. (We've discussed this before... The Beau's scales look more cross-hatched.)

Papa Bear's Damsel is a Threespot.

This is a very small fish...I assume if it looked like just over an inch, it was really 3/4 or so...juvenile's here go up to around 3 inches...with a size overlap with adult phase around that 3 inch size. Of the thousands we have here, none are even remotely this color... even when adults, and particularly at this size...it was swimming with juvenile's three times it's size.

But, except for the white area, it does look like one....dwarf version?

For a size reference.. that white coral it is above is around the diameter of pencil.

 

[deborahdelamar]

Maybe you don't see them that small because those don't survive and this one may soon be gone, too? I really can't imagine that it could be anything other than a Cocoa and I have a very good imagination! Take care.