Atlantic goliath grouper
Epinephelus itajara
Coney
Cephalopholis fulva
About
The coney is a small, robust grouper that can shift between three different colour looks, from deep red to bright yellow, while keeping the same fixed markings underneath. It grows to about 44 cm long.
- Length
- 44 cm
- Depth
- 1–40 m
How to tell it apart
Its shifting colours make it easy to confuse with other small groupers on the same reef. Whatever the colour phase, look for the two black spots on top of the tail base and the two at the jaw tip; every coney carries them.
Appearance
It has a stocky, oblong body with a pointed snout and large round eyes. Colouring varies: a red form found in deeper water, an orange-brown form on shallower reefs, and a yellow form at almost any depth. Red and orange-brown fish are covered in small blue spots with dark edges; on yellow fish these spots are fewer and limited to the head and front of the body. In every colour form, two small black spots sit on top of the base of the tail and two more mark the tip of the lower jaw.
Habitat
It lives on coral reefs and over rocky ground in clear water across the western Atlantic and Caribbean, from the Bahamas and Gulf of Mexico south to Brazil. By day it hides in caves or under ledges, then comes out at night to hunt.
Did you know?
Young coneys can look almost identical to damselfish, a disguise that likely helps them blend in among the smaller fish on the reef.
Log it in Into the Blue
Describe what you saw and we name it, then keep every species you find in your Oceandex.
