Sea goldie

Content sourced from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

The sea goldie (Pseudanthias squamipinnis) is a colorful reef fish also known as the orange basslet and many other names. It lives in warm, clear waters of the Indo-Pacific, from the Red Sea to Japan, the Great Barrier Reef, and southeast Australia. It is common in the aquarium trade and is not found in the Persian Gulf, Hawaii, or Oman.

Sea goldies show strong differences between males and females. They mainly eat zooplankton. This fish is a protogynous hermaphrodite: the largest female can become a male if the current male dies or leaves, a change that takes weeks to months. A male keeps a harem of about five to ten females. Spawning happens at sunset, between December and February in the Red Sea.

They live around coral outcrops in clear lagoons, patch reefs, and steep reef slopes down to about 35 meters, often in very large schools above the reef. The Midas blenny can mimic the sea goldie by turning yellow.

Scientific name: Pseudanthias squamipinnis (Peters, 1885)
Classification: Kingdom Animalia; Phylum Chordata; Class Actinopterygii; Order Perciformes; Family Anthiadidae; Genus Pseudanthias; Species squamipinnis

Conservation status: Least Concern (IUCN 3.1).