Anemones Clownfish – Photo taken on Cabilao Island, Philippines
Clownfish (Amphiprion ocellaris) are colorful fish with shades ranging from yellow to orange, brown or pink, but thanks to the success of the movie “Finding Nemo” we always picture them by their most common color combination: bright orange with white stripes surrounded by thin black lines.
Clownfish has its habitat in poisonous anemones, where they live, take shelter, breed, feed and spawn, although they only live in 10 of the more than 1,000 kinds of anemone that exist. By a curious quirk of nature this small fish is able to live surrounded by the stinging tentacles of its host using them as a defense mechanism against predators, but also as a source of food.
This beneficial relationship that both animals have is called mutualism. The clownfish do not need anemones to survive (as demonstrated by their remaining years in aquariums without the presence of anemones) nor anemones die without the help of the clownfish, but they have found in this collaboration an easier way to survive. The clownfish is not born immune to anemones, they generate mucous at birth and during its lifetime that helps them immunize.
Another fascinating skill of these striking fish is its ability to change sex. They are hermaphrodites and all of the are born males but the oldest specimens of the colony become female to be fertilized by the next male in the hierarchy, just one. When the female dies, the next in age, the dominant male, mutates to female to mate with the male following the hierarchy, repeating the process over and over again.
After saving the eggs for 3 to 5 days around the anemone, eggs hatch and the group takes cares for the pups until they reach sexual maturity. The clownfish, far from its image of kind fish, are highly aggressive territorial fish that do not hesitate to attack if they or their progeny feel threatened. Even if its guest is attacked, like in the case of butterfly fish that feed on anemone polyps, they will be aggressive to them.
