Biodiversity Data Journal :
Short Communication
|
Corresponding author: Benjamín Delgado-Pech (benjamin.delgado@cicy.mx)
Academic editor: Felipe Ottoni
Received: 27 Apr 2020 | Accepted: 08 Jul 2020 | Published: 27 Jul 2020
© 2020 Benjamín Delgado-Pech, Antonio Almazán-Becerril, Jorge Peniche-Pérez, José Adán Caballero-Vázquez
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citation:
Delgado-Pech B, Almazán-Becerril A, Peniche-Pérez J, Caballero-Vázquez JA (2020) Facultative scavenging feeding habits in Acanthurus chirurgus (Bloch, 1787) (Acanthuriformes: Acanthuridae). Biodiversity Data Journal 8: e53712. https://doi.org/10.3897/BDJ.8.e53712
|
|
The family Acanthuridae is a key component of coral reef ecosystems as it controls macroalgae biomass buildup. During routine monitoring of benthic communities in the Mexican Caribbean, we observed unusual behaviour of a group of Acanthurus chirurgus, which were feeding on a tuna head left on site by travel tour personnel. This phenomenon has been documented in other herbivorous fish species, especially in places where tourism is a major coastal activity. Although many Acanthurus seek additional sources of protein by feeding on detritus, it is unusual for them to feed directly on fish flesh. Acanthurus chirurgus will incorporate proteins from animal tissues whenever the opportunity arises. Such opportunities occurred rarely in the past, but have become more frequent recently, related to increasing tourism activities where flesh is used as bait to attract the surrounding fauna.
Caribbean Sea, coral reef, herbivorous fish, Mesoamerican Reef System.
Acanthuridae is a conspicuous and abundant family of herbivorous fish commonly inhabiting coral reef systems. Currently, 86 species in six genera are recognised to belong to this family, whose distribution encompasses tropical and subtropical coastal environments (
This behaviour demonstrates that this species exhibits facultative feeding habits and raises several questions: 1) How widely does this facultative behaviour occur amongst herbivorous reef fish families? 2) what physiological or ecological mechanisms trigger facultative scavenging habits in Acanthurus? and 3) what are the implications of this behaviour for the trophic structure and functioning of these ecosystems?
Facultative feeding habits have been reported in numerous groups of herbivorous fish. For example,
Centro de Investigación Científica de Yucatán A.C. (CICY). Unidad de Ciencias del Agua. Calle 8, No. 39, Mz. 29, S.M. 64, 77500. Cancún Quitana Roo. México.
The evidence presented in this short communication did not come from a preconceived project aimed at assessing the feeding behaviour of A. chirurgus. The video hereby described was serendipitously obtained while recording submerged aquatic vegetation. We witnessed this event when we came across fish remains that had been recently discarded by others. Hence, we did not collect, manipulate or experiment with any living organism.
Delgado-Pech Benjamín: Conceptualisation, Investigation, Visualisation, Writing - original draft, Writing - review and editing. Almazán-Becerril Antonio: Conceptualisation, Investigation, Visualisation, Writing - original draft, Writing - review and editing. Peniche-Pérez Jorge and Caballero-Vázquez Adán: Writing - editing.
The authors claim no conflict of interest with this work.