Description

Also known as Coralfish, Crowned Pearlyscale Butterflyfish, Netted Butterflyfish, Orange Butterflyfish, Pearlscale Butterfly, Pearlscale Butterflyfish, Philippine Chevron Butterflyfish, Red-checkered Pearlscale Butterflyfish, Yellowtail Butterflyfish, Yellow-tailed Butterflyfish.

Found singly, or in pairs, around staghorn corals, over drop-offs, of outer reef slopes.
They feed on algae and benthic invertebrates.
Length - 14cm
Depth - 6-50m
Widespread Western Pacific

Replaced by
Chaetodon madagaskariensis in the Indian Ocean
http://www.whatsthatfish.com/fish/madagascar-butterflyfish/1491
Chaetodon mertensii in the Pacific Ocean
http://www.whatsthatfish.com/fish/yellowback-butterflyfish/1508#2
Chaetodon paucifasciatus in the Red Sea
http://www.whatsthatfish.com/fish/crown-butterflyfish/1492


Butterflyfishes have very fine hair like teeth that enable them to pick out small organisms inaccessible to most other fish for eating.
They thrive mainly on a diet of coral polyps, tentacles of featherdusters and Christmas-tree worms. As these food sources all zap back into their shells, butterflyfishes need to be able to hover motionless while picking at the coral and to dart swiftly over short distances to get the worm before it retracts. They do this by using their Pectoral fins as oars to brake, sprint, turn and even reverse. Ref: https://www.fishbase.se/summary/Chaetodon-xanthurus.html