Green wrasse
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 |
||||||||||||||
| Scientific classification | ||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||
|
|
||||||||||||||
| Notolabrus inscriptus (Richardson, 1848) |
The green wrasse, Notolabrus inscriptus, is a wrasse of the genus Notolabrus, found in eastern Australia including Lord Howe Island and Norfolk Island, the Kermadec Islands, and the north east coast of the North Island in New Zealand, in reef areas at depths of between 5 and 20 m. Its length is between 30 and 60 cm.
The green wrasse is similar in size and shape to the New Zealand banded wrasse. It has three distinct colour phases and becomes more deeper bodied and blunt headed as it increases in size. Young fish are orange-brown with a green tinged head and horizontal silver-yellow stripes that become broader on the belly. Early-adult fish are brown with yellow-brown scribbled markings on each scale, some of which tend to form horizontal lines. Terminal phase males are dark olive green with a series of small yellow dots on each scale and pale yellow dorsal and anal fins. There is also a dark triangular area at the front of the dorsal fin.
[edit] References
- Notolabrus inscriptus (TSN 614017). Integrated Taxonomic Information System. Accessed on 18 April 2006.
- "Notolabrus inscriptus". FishBase. Ed. Ranier Froese and Daniel Pauly. January 2006 version. N.p.: FishBase, 2006.
- Tony Ayling & Geoffrey Cox, Collins Guide to the Sea Fishes of New Zealand, (William Collins Publishers Ltd, Auckland, New Zealand 1982) ISBN 0-00-216987-8
- Wade Doak, A Photographic Guide to Sea Fishes of New Zealand, (New Holland Publishers (NZ) Ltd, Auckland, New Zealand 2003) ISBN 1-877246-95-6
