Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations What kind of saltwater fish is this?

I know this if off topic but ladies and gentlemen I need your help. I know didly squat about saltwater fish and just mounted this fish. I'm dong this for another taxidermist and he says the customer says it's a "Grunt." Grunts only have 12 dorsal spines and this one had 16. It also does not seem to match any of the Grunt species I have been able to find illustrations of -- not just in color -- but in body conformation and caudal fin shape. But I could be wrong.

I know the pic is of a dead faded fish but it's the best I can do.

Anyone know for sure what it is? Please don't guess. I can do that.

Boy am I embarrassed! This is not a saltwater fish. It's probably a Talapia just like the one on the PRRF site entered by Harold!

I'm going to have a talk with that other taxidermist!

Cecil,
It sure looks like a tilapia. I think it might bark like a tilapia, too.

Compared to my pictures it is a tilapia

Cecil, It looks exactly like the Niles Tilapia I had in my pond this year. They all died at end of november or I would send picture. Would bet the farm on it being a Niles. PO

Being an ex-aquarist at Sea World of Florida, I can tell you that it is NOT a grunt. We used to harvest our Tilapia out of the ponds and sell them to a cat food company. This is an exact duplicate of a Tilapia.

That's what my Tilapia look like.

Tilapia, no doubt.

Whew! You had me scared, too, Cecil! My first glance said Tilapia (or at least some type of cichlid), but then I know nothing of marine fishes!

Here goes "too much information." Tilapia are members of the Cichlidae family, which really are the South American and African "ecological equivalents" of our Centrarchidae (sunfishes and black basses). The peacock bass is a big predator, while the oscar and tilapia have roles like our sunfishes.

OK, now back to the point. Cichlids have "split" lateral lines. It's a little hard to see on your photo, but I thought I could see them. The lateral line coming back from the head is easy to see. If you look closely, you can see the lateral line coming forward from the tail. In the Cichlidae family, those two laterals lines don't connect (don't meet). I have my students go to the pet store or Wal-Mart and look at their African cichlids, and even the freshwater angelfish, and spot the split lateral lines.

Thank you very much everyone. It going to be interesting when I take this fish to the taxidermist I am doing it for and ask him if his customer is on drugs or he gave me the wrong fish!

Here I went to all the trouble to cast the head and degrease the skin because I thought it was a saltwater fish!

Grunts I have caught usually have very colorful tongues and oral cavities. And, of course, they grunt when you take them out of the water (if alive).

"Grunts I have caught usually have very colorful tongues and oral cavities"

Layton,

You wouldn't be a dentist or orthodontist, would you?