How to Identify a Coney Fish

Video Transcript

"The marine organism we're going to identify now is the coney. The easiest way to identify a coney is to look at their lower lip. Adults have two very obvious black dots on their lower lip, one on either side of the midpoint. They also have two dark spots on the base of their tail behind the dorsal fin but the lip spots make it a very easy fish to identify. This is a good thing since the colors can vary tremendously. Coney's have three very distinctive color phases and many that are derivations to the basic three. The first and the most striking to me is the goldenface. In this color phase a coney is a bright yellow-gold color over their entire body. They may have small spots of blue or a darker color on their face and across their back. This is also the least common of the three primary color phases. The second color phase is a bicolor phase. In this color phase, the coney will have the lower part of their body a whitish color and the upper part, brown to reddish brown. Many small reddish brown to dark brown spots may also cover their body. The split between the light and dark areas is usually well demarcated but the point at which the split occurs can vary. By far the most common color phase is the brown color phase. In this phase the entire body will be brown to reddish brown although the mid body area may be a bit lighter in color. They usually also have numerous small yellow to dark brown spots over the entire body. Coney's are quite common on the Caribbean and Florida reefs. During the day they can often be found resting on the bottom under a coral ledge or in between two coral heads. They use their pectoral fins to help maintain a vertical attitude while resting on the bottom. They can be quite curious and are often unintimidated by divers. Since they can be found on shallow reefs as well as much deeper reefs both snorkelers and divers should be able to observe these fish. They are most commonly seen in the size range of six to ten inches but a maximum size that's sixteen inches has been reported. Coney's feed mostly on small fishes and crustaceans. They can sometimes be seen following a hunting moray eel, hoping that the moray will poke it's head into a hole on the reef scaring out a small fish which the coney can quickly consume. As with all sea basses, the coney is a protagonist hermaphrodite. This means that all fish start out life as females and turn into males as they mature and reach a size of about eight or nine inches in length. During spawning, males will gather a harem of females and spawn with several from the harem everyday during the breeding season. Eggs are fertilized externally and allowed to drift with the currents until they hatch. That's the coney."