Maui Snorkeling Trips

Ember Parrotfish, Photo Courtesy Dr. Jack Randall                               

Regal Parrotfish Females, Photo Courtesy Dr. Jack Randall

Parrotfish are an amazing group of animals so named for their beak-like dentition and colorful bodies.  Also very interesting to this author is the fact that they have a series of molariform teeth on the upper and lower bony plates at the back of the throat, upper convex and lower concave, enabling them to easily crunch up whatever they choose to eat.  They do not have a true stomach and for a fish, have an extremely long intestine.  It is also believed that these colorful fish evolved from the wrasse family, one we will talk about in an upcoming post.

Like the wrasses, juveniles are often really different from adults, and there are also different color patterns indicating sex.  Most species will undergo a sex reversal from female to male, changing color from the drab (called initial phase), like the pair of Regal in the picture, to the more gaudy colorful males (called terminal phase).  Some species are both female and male in the initial phase.  Spawning when in this phase will have male dominated aggregations.  Sexual territories will be established by terminal males with a harem of females being maintained!  (Who knew?)  They will court and spawn with individual females.  (Sounds almost like some human behaviors.)

So, what’s for lunch?  Many parrotfishes graze on algae from rock surfaces.  If the surface is dead coral, they are scraping into the limestone.  Others take algae growing on sand surfaces, ingesting the sand as well, and according to researchers, some of the larger species feed on live coral, leaving the well-known scraping marks characteristic of their amazing dentition.  The algae, along with rock tidbits, coral, and sand, is digested.  In this process the limestone fragments are ground into sand and the sand they eat is ground into even finer sand.  Parrotfishes are the major producers of sand in the coral reefs!  It is said by some researchers that an individual is capable of processing up to ONE TON of sand per year!  WOW!

So, for the average snorkeler, if you hold still, watch and listen, you will hear the sound of frying bacon.  Part of that is the busy parrotfish grazing on their breakfast, or lunch.  They do not eat dinner.  According to researchers, parrotfish will back into a reef after sunset, secrete a mucous bubble mass of protection and rest until sunrise.  After sunrise they will eat the ‘front door’ and emerge, ready for a new day.  As with all the other creatures of the islands, the Hawaiians did have a name for each species, although many names have been lost over time.  The general name for this colorful animal of the reef is uhu. 

Planning a trip our way?  The blue waters of the Pacific await you.  Grab a mask, fins, and get yourself out there to watch the hardworking parrotfish produce part of our islands beaches.  What an amazing place, our planet Earth!

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