- Source: Ostracion immaculatum
Ostracion immaculatum, the bluespotted boxfish or immaculate boxfish, is a species of marine ray-finned fish belonging to the family Ostraciidae, the boxfishes. This species is found in the Western Pacific Ocean off Eastern Asia.
Taxonomy
Ostracion immaculatum was first formally described as Ostracion immaculatus in 1850 by Coenraad Jacob Temminck and Hermann Schlegel with its type locality given as Japan. The bluespotted trunkfish is classified in the genus Ostracion which the 5th edition of Fishes of the World classifies within the family Ostraciidae in the suborder Ostracioidea within the order Tetraodontiformes.
Etymology
Ostracion immaculatum is classified in the genus Ostracion, this name means "little box" and is an allusion to the shape of the body of its type species, O. cubicum. The specific name, immaculatum means "unspotted" and is a reference to the unspotted appearrance of this fish when preserved in alcohol, although in life they are covered with spots.
Description
Ostracion immaculatum are yellow and blue in colopur as adults with light blue spots on each of the plate=like scales that form the carapace. The juveniles are bright yellow with small pale blue and black spots, the black spots fade as the fish grows and the blue spots expand. This species has a maximum published standard length of 25 cm (9.8 in).
Distribution and habitat
Ostracium immaculatum is found in the northwestern Pacific Ocean from the southern coiats of Hokkaido south through the Japanese archipelago to Taiwan and along the mainland coast of Asia from Korea to Hong Kong. It is found at deptsh between 1 and 60 m (3 ft 3 in and 196 ft 10 in) on reefs close to the shore in shallow water where there is a rocky bottom.
Biology
Ostracion immaculatus lives in small groups consisting of a single male and three or four females.
