Ghost cardinalfish
Nectamia fusca
Valid name (FishBase; confirmed in Eschmeyer's Catalog of Fishes and WoRMS, October 2026).
- English
- Ghost cardinalfish
- Scientific
- Nectamia fusca
- Dhivehi
- No recorded Dhivehi name
- Group
- Reef fish
- Maximum size
- Up to about 11 cm (total length) (FishBase); MRS 1997 gives max. 10 cm
- Depth and habitat
- Coral reefs and reef-associated habitats, recorded from 1 to 20 m
- IUCN status
- LC · Least ConcernLeast Concern (LC), assessed 2009
Description
A deep-bodied, coppery to silvery cardinalfish with a dark saddle on the upper tail base, a wedge-shaped dark bar below the eye and a black tip to the first dorsal fin. It hides in thickets of branching staghorn coral by day and comes out at night to feed on small crustaceans, worms and fish. It belongs to a group of very similar species that are hard to tell apart.
In the Maldives
Recorded by MRS (1997) under the name Apogon savayensis; MRS notes three very similar species of this group in the Maldives, one of them then undescribed. No Dhivehi name is given in the available MRS text.
Sources
- fishbase.se /summary/Nectamia-fusca.html
- fao.org /4/AD471E/AD471E00.htm
- commons.wikimedia.org /wiki/File:NectamFuscaRickardZerpe.jpg
Dhivehi name source: No Dhivehi name found in MRS 1997 (available chapters), FishBase (country: Maldives) or Dhivehi Wikipedia.