The schooling bannerfish (''Heniochus diphreutes''), also known as the false moorish idol, is a marine

ray-finned fish Actinopterygii (; ), members of which are known as ray-finned fish or actinopterygians, is a class of bony fish that comprise over 50% of living vertebrate species. They are so called because of their lightly built fins made of webbings of sk ...

, a

butterflyfish The butterflyfish are a group of conspicuous tropical ocean, marine fish of the family Chaetodontidae; the bannerfish and coralfish are also included in this group. The approximately 129 species in 12 genera are found mostly on the reefs of the ...

from the

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

Chaetodontidae. It is native to the

Indo-Pacific The Indo-Pacific is a vast biogeographic region of Earth. In a narrow sense, sometimes known as the Indo-West Pacific or Indo-Pacific Asia, it comprises the tropical waters of the Indian Ocean, the western and central Pacific Ocean, and the ...

area.

Description

The schooling bannerfish is a small fish that can reach a maximum length of 18–21 cm.Lieske & Myers,''Coral reef fishes'', Princeton University Press, 2009, Kuiter, R.H. and T. Tonozuka, 2001. Pictorial guide to Indonesian reef fishes. Part 2. Fusiliers - Dragonets, Caesionidae - Callionymidae. Zoonetics, Australia. 304-622 p. Its body is compressed laterally, and the first rays of its

dorsal fin A dorsal fin is a fin on the back of most marine and freshwater vertebrates. Dorsal fins have evolved independently several times through convergent evolution adapting to marine environments, so the fins are not all homologous. They are found ...

stretch in a long white filament. Its background color is white with two large black diagonal bands. Beyond the second black stripe, the

dorsal Dorsal (from Latin ''dorsum'' ‘back’) may refer to: * Dorsal (anatomy), an anatomical term of location referring to the back or upper side of an organism or parts of an organism * Dorsal, positioned on top of an aircraft's fuselage The fus ...

, caudal fins and

pectoral fins Fins are moving appendages protruding from the body of fish that interact with water to generate thrust and help the fish swim. Apart from the tail or caudal fin, fish fins have no direct connection with the back bone and are supported only b ...

are yellow. The head is white, the eyes are black and linked together by a black to gray band. The short snout, spotted with black to gray, has a small terminal, extensible mouth.

Distribution and habitat

The schooling bannerfish is widespread throughout the tropical, subtropical and temperate waters of the

from the eastern coast of

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

Red Sea The Red Sea is a sea inlet of the Indian Ocean, lying between Africa and Asia. Its connection to the ocean is in the south, through the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait and the Gulf of Aden. To its north lie the Sinai Peninsula, the Gulf of Aqaba, and th ...

included, to

Polynesia Polynesia ( , ) is a subregion of Oceania, made up of more than 1,000 islands scattered over the central and southern Pacific Ocean. The indigenous people who inhabit the islands of Polynesia are called Polynesians. They have many things in ...

and

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; ) is an island U.S. state, state of the United States, in the Pacific Ocean about southwest of the U.S. mainland. One of the two Non-contiguous United States, non-contiguous U.S. states (along with Alaska), it is the only sta ...

and from the

Great barrier reef The Great Barrier Reef is the world's largest coral reef system, composed of over 2,900 individual reefs and 900 islands stretching for over over an area of approximately . The reef is located in the Coral Sea, off the coast of Queensland, ...

, to south

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

to the

Kermadec Islands The Kermadec Islands ( ; ) are a subtropical island arc in the South Pacific Ocean northeast of New Zealand's North Island, and a similar distance southwest of Tonga. The islands are part of New Zealand. They are in total area and uninhabit ...

(

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

). The schooling bannerfish prefers external reef slopes and channels. It has a large depth range and is usually observed at 5–30 m depth, but may reach 210 meters deep in some localities.Allen, G.R. and M.V. Erdmann, 2012. Reef fishes of the East Indies. Perth, Australia: University of Hawai'i Press, Volumes I-III. Tropical Reef Research.

Ecology

As is indicated by its common name, the schooling bannerfish lives in large groups. It feeds on zooplankton in the open water, and juveniles may act as

cleaner fish Cleaner fish are fish that show a specialist feeding strategy by providing a service to other species, referred to as clients, by removing dead skin, ectoparasites, and infected tissue from the surface or gill chambers. This example of cleaning ...

,Rudie Kuiter, “Chaetodontidae & Microcanthidae”, Aquatic Photographics, 2004, and this has also been seen in adults. This

oviparous Oviparous animals are animals that reproduce by depositing fertilized zygotes outside the body (i.e., by laying or spawning) in metabolically independent incubation organs known as eggs, which nurture the embryo into moving offsprings kno ...

species forms pairs to breed. They have been observed cleaning parasites off the short sunfish ('' Mola ramsayi'') off the Maldives.

Conservation status

In some geographic areas, the schooling bannerfish is harvested for the aquarium trade and is commonly sold as a cheaper alternative to the

Moorish idol The Moorish idol (''Zanclus cornutus'') is a species of marine ray-finned fish belonging to the family Zanclidae. It is the only member of the monospecific genus ''Zanclus'' and the only extant species within the Zanclidae. This species is found ...

. However, there do not appear to be any major current threats to this species, and it is listed as

Least Concern A least-concern species is a species that has been evaluated and categorized by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as not being a focus of wildlife conservation because the specific species is still plentiful in the wil ...

by the

IUCN The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. Founded in 1948, IUCN has become the global authority on the status ...

References

External links

* {{Taxonbar, from=Q2717391 schooling bannerfish schooling bannerfish Taxa named by David Starr Jordan