Doug, Curaçao
Info
Apogon pillionatus is a very rare cardinalfish, of which there are very few photos of a live fish in its natural habitat.
Doug, who kindly provided us with his great photo, wrote about it:
“ I remember taking the photo. It was in Bonaire and we were diving in a rubble area. I saw the fish, took a few photos and didn't give it a second thought. When we looked at the photos later, we realized that it was a very rare fish. When we came back later to take more (better) photos, we couldn't find it. We never saw one again.”
The perch prefers boulder bottoms near reefs, where it can quickly find good protection from predators.
Rarely occurring animals are naturally also less well studied due to their rarity, as illustrated by the different data on the cardinalfish:
Water depth according to
FishBase: 5 - 90 meters
IUCN Red List: 7 - 90 meters
Shorefishes of the Greater Caribbean online information system: 7 - 122 meters
Unfortunately, all sources fail to provide a detailed indication of the preferred food of the perch!
The cardinalfish is red with 2 dark bars: a narrow bar under the back of the dorsal fin and in front of the base of the tail, and a very wide bar at the end of the base of the tail, separated by a distance < the width of the rear bar.
Often a light narrow white bar is visible immediately behind each of these dark bars, sometimes a white bar is visible in front of the first dark bar.
We would like to thank Doug from Curaçao for his kindness in sharing his photo of Apogon pillionatus with us.
For the special friends and lovers of cardinalfishes we recommend the download of the book “Cardinalfishes of the World” by Rudie H. Kuiter:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335777894_ApogonidaeFishesLRs
The term "reef safe" is often used in marine aquaristics, especially when buying a new species people often ask if the new animal is "reef safe".
What exactly does reef safe mean?
To answer this question, you can ask target-oriented questions and inquire in forums, clubs, dealers and with aquarist friends:
- Are there already experiences and keeping reports that assure that the new animal can live in other suitably equipped aquariums without ever having caused problems?
- Is there any experience of invertebrates (crustaceans, hermits, mussels, snails) or corals being attacked by other inhabitants such as fish of the same or a different species?
- Is any information known or expected about a possible change in dietary habits, e.g., from a plant-based diet to a meat-based diet?
- Do the desired animals leave the reef structure "alone", do they constantly change it (boring starfish, digger gobies, parrotfish, triggerfish) and thus disturb or displace other co-inhabitants?
- do new animals tend to get diseases repeatedly and very quickly and can they be treated?
- Do known peaceful animals change their character in the course of their life and become aggressive?
- Can the death of a new animal possibly even lead to the death of the rest of the stock through poisoning (possible with some species of sea cucumbers)?
- Last but not least the keeper of the animals has to be included in the "reef safety", there are actively poisonous, passively poisonous animals, animals that have dangerous biting or stinging weapons, animals with extremely strong nettle poisons, these have to be (er)known and a plan of action should have been made in advance in case of an attack on the aquarist (e.g. telephone numbers of the poison control center, the treating doctor, the tropical institute etc.).
If all questions are evaluated positively in the sense of the animal(s) and the keeper, then one can assume a "reef safety".
Doug, who kindly provided us with his great photo, wrote about it:
“ I remember taking the photo. It was in Bonaire and we were diving in a rubble area. I saw the fish, took a few photos and didn't give it a second thought. When we looked at the photos later, we realized that it was a very rare fish. When we came back later to take more (better) photos, we couldn't find it. We never saw one again.”
The perch prefers boulder bottoms near reefs, where it can quickly find good protection from predators.
Rarely occurring animals are naturally also less well studied due to their rarity, as illustrated by the different data on the cardinalfish:
Water depth according to
FishBase: 5 - 90 meters
IUCN Red List: 7 - 90 meters
Shorefishes of the Greater Caribbean online information system: 7 - 122 meters
Unfortunately, all sources fail to provide a detailed indication of the preferred food of the perch!
The cardinalfish is red with 2 dark bars: a narrow bar under the back of the dorsal fin and in front of the base of the tail, and a very wide bar at the end of the base of the tail, separated by a distance < the width of the rear bar.
Often a light narrow white bar is visible immediately behind each of these dark bars, sometimes a white bar is visible in front of the first dark bar.
We would like to thank Doug from Curaçao for his kindness in sharing his photo of Apogon pillionatus with us.
For the special friends and lovers of cardinalfishes we recommend the download of the book “Cardinalfishes of the World” by Rudie H. Kuiter:
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335777894_ApogonidaeFishesLRs
The term "reef safe" is often used in marine aquaristics, especially when buying a new species people often ask if the new animal is "reef safe".
What exactly does reef safe mean?
To answer this question, you can ask target-oriented questions and inquire in forums, clubs, dealers and with aquarist friends:
- Are there already experiences and keeping reports that assure that the new animal can live in other suitably equipped aquariums without ever having caused problems?
- Is there any experience of invertebrates (crustaceans, hermits, mussels, snails) or corals being attacked by other inhabitants such as fish of the same or a different species?
- Is any information known or expected about a possible change in dietary habits, e.g., from a plant-based diet to a meat-based diet?
- Do the desired animals leave the reef structure "alone", do they constantly change it (boring starfish, digger gobies, parrotfish, triggerfish) and thus disturb or displace other co-inhabitants?
- do new animals tend to get diseases repeatedly and very quickly and can they be treated?
- Do known peaceful animals change their character in the course of their life and become aggressive?
- Can the death of a new animal possibly even lead to the death of the rest of the stock through poisoning (possible with some species of sea cucumbers)?
- Last but not least the keeper of the animals has to be included in the "reef safety", there are actively poisonous, passively poisonous animals, animals that have dangerous biting or stinging weapons, animals with extremely strong nettle poisons, these have to be (er)known and a plan of action should have been made in advance in case of an attack on the aquarist (e.g. telephone numbers of the poison control center, the treating doctor, the tropical institute etc.).
If all questions are evaluated positively in the sense of the animal(s) and the keeper, then one can assume a "reef safety".
