Dragonet
Small, colorful benthic fish with elaborate courtship and spawning behaviors.
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Dragonets are fish in the family Callionymidae, order Callionymiformes, class Teleostei.[1] They are sometimes called gobies but are not true gobies, as they belong to a different family.[2] Many dragonets are strikingly coloured and several species are kept by aquarists.[2]
Scientific classification
- KingdomAnimalia
- PhylumChordata
- ClassActinopterygii
- DivisionTeleostei
- OrderSyngnathiformes
- FamilyCallionymidae
Named by Bonaparte, 1831
Sources: Wikipedia taxobox: Dragonet (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Quick Facts
- Type species
- Callionymus lyra
Facts from the source article.
Biology and range
Dragonets are mainly found in the tropical waters of the Indo-West Pacific.[2] They have been found down to a depth of roughly 200 meters and prefer rocky or sandy bottoms.[2] Dragonets are pelagic spawners and do not guard their offspring.[2] Male dragonets are highly territorial towards each other.[2]
Dragonets have elongated bodies that lack scales.[3] A notable feature is a large preopercular spine, which in certain species is thought to be venomous.[3] To capture prey, they use highly protractible jaws that extend forward to draw food into the mouth.[4] When threatened, a dragonet can quickly bury itself in sand, leaving only its eyes exposed.[5]
What the specialist sources record
The Aquatic Community account notes that most dragonets are specialized eaters that will only eat live food in an aquarium.[2] The same source states that the largest known species is the Longtail dragonet, reaching 30 cm, and the smallest is the St. Helena dragonet, rarely exceeding 2 cm.[2] A 1996 paper by Gonzales et al. reports that among two dragonet species in Tosa Bay, amphipods are the most plentiful prey during spring and winter.[6][7] The WoRMS database records the family Callionymidae as marine, brackish, and freshwater.[1]
GBIF holds 395,263 occurrence records for the family Callionymidae as of October 2026.[8] According to Gonzales (1996), ophiuroids and amphipods are the main prey items for these fish during summer.[6][7]
References
- World Register of Marine Species, Callionymidae (AphiaID 125522). CC BY 4.0. marinespecies.org
- "Dragonets", Aquatic Community. facts only, no text reused. aquaticcommunity.com
- Wikipedia, "Dragonet" (CC BY-SA 4.0) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Dragonet" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Harrington, "Behavior patterns and sexual dimorphism in the spotted dragonet, Diplogrammus pauciradiatus (Pisces: Callionymidae)", Bulletin of Marine Science, 1997, p. 872–893 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Dragonet" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Frische, "The Fingered Dragonet Imposing presence – inconspicuous coloration", Aqualog News, p. 23–24 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Dragonet" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Gonzales, "Diet and feeding behavior of two dragonets Calliurichthys japonicus and Repomucenus huguenini in Tosa Bay, Southern Japan", Fisheries Science, 1996, p. 902–908 (we also read that source) en.wikipedia.org
- Benjamin Jareta Gonzales, "Diet and Feeding Behavior of Two Dragonets Calliurichthys japonicus and Repomucenus huguenini in Tosa Bay, Southern Japan", Fisheries Science (1996), doi:10.2331/fishsci.62.902. OpenAlex metadata CC0; paper not read. doi.org
- GBIF Backbone Taxonomy and occurrence index, Callionymidae (taxon key 8511). CC BY 4.0 (backbone); counts are facts. gbif.org
Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Dragonet (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.
More in Bony Fish
Sources
Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.
- Wikipedia: Dragonet (CC BY-SA 4.0).
- Word definitions: the , each quoted from its Wikipedia article.
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