African Striped Grunt
Parapristipoma octolineatum
Oblique-banded Sweetlips
Plectorhinchus lineatus
About
A big, pale grunt with a face full of yellow, the oblique-banded sweetlips grows up to 72 cm and rests conspicuously near coral outcrops by day before feeding after dark.
Also known as: diagonal-banded sweetlips, many-lined sweetlips, lined sweetlips, goldman's sweetlips, lined blubber-lips, yellowbanded sweetlips
- Length
- 72 cm
- Depth
- up to 35 m
How to tell it apart
Other sweetlips on the same reefs also show grey bodies with dark markings. This one's stripes run diagonally and break up rather than forming clean straight bands, and its lips are a strong yellow rather than pale or dark.
Appearance
Adults are light grey, turning white on the belly, with a striking set of broken, diagonal black stripes across the upper body. The lips are bright yellow, and the fins carry a yellow wash, with black spots on the tail, anal and dorsal fins and red spots at the base of the pelvic fins. Young fish look completely different: they start out with a few dark brown bands and slowly turn dark chocolate-brown above, crossed by a fine web of white lines, before that pattern breaks apart into small spots as they mature into adults.
Habitat
It lives on clear coral slopes of inner and outer reefs, from 1 to 35 metres deep, alone or in groups. Young fish hide alone on shallow, sheltered reefs. It rests near coral outcrops during the day and moves out over open sand and seagrass to feed at night.
Did you know?
Linnaeus gave this fish its species name, lineatus, meaning 'lined,' when he first described it in 1758. It refers to the dark bars on its body, which run horizontal on young fish and diagonal on adults.
Log it in Into the Blue
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