Photo of the Week: Distinctly Colorful

Cirrhilabrus cyanogularis, also known as the the blue-throated fairy wrasse, is a new species described by Ben Frable, collection manager at Scripps Oceanography’s Marine Vertebrate Collection, and colleagues from Australian research centers. Photo by Y.K. Tea.

Ornamental fish collectors first noticed the wrasse at depths around 27 meters (90 feet) in the Philippines and the species soon appeared in home aquariums.

Researchers at first thought the fish was a hybrid between Tono's and the Whipfin Fairy wrasses. Frable and colleagues, however, identified the wrasse as a distinct species native to the Philippines and Indonesia through DNA and morphological analysis and described it May 11 in the journal Zootaxa.

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