Knobsnout Parrotfish (male)

Scarus ovifrons is a species of parrotfish famous for its characteristic blue color.

Description

It grows to a maximum length of about 90 cm. Its body is a strong blue color, and may have reddish-brown, white, or black spots on it. Adult fish have whitish spots on their cheeks and a lump on their foreheads. Young fish have no spots on their cheeks or lumps on their foreheads.

Distribution

It is found in the northwestern Pacific Ocean off Japan and Taiwan.

Habitat

It lives in reefs and coral reefs. Adults live either solitary or in smaller groups on rocky reefs near the coast.

At first glance, juvenile Scarus ovifrons can easily pass as juvenile wrasse. In adult males, a thick "hump head" forms in the course of development, which can also be seen in some wrasses (Bodianus reticulatus), but they differ these types among others also very clearly through their diet, scraping off the surface of the reef, also eating various cortical polyps. Palytoxin from crustacean anemones has been detected several times in the bodies of these parrot fish, wrasse usually do not eat corals, but mainly invertebrates, crustaceans and smaller fish.