Everything about Reef Triggerfish totally explained
» humuhumunukunukuāpua`a redirects here. For the Rhinecanthus aculeatus of the same name, see Lagoon triggerfish.
The
reef,
rectangular,
wedge-tail, or
Picasso triggerfish, also known by its
Hawaiian name,
humuhumunukunukuāpua`a (also spelled
Humuhumunukunukuapua'a or just
humuhumu for short; meaning "triggerfish with a snout like a pig"), is one of several
species of
triggerfish. Classified as
Rhinecanthus rectangulus, it's endemic to the salt water coasts of various central and south
Pacific Ocean islands. It is often asserted that the Hawaiian name is
one of the longest words in the English Language and that "the name is longer than the fish."
Description
The triggerfish's teeth are blue and are set close together inside its relatively chubby mouth, it has a small second spine, which it can use to lock its main spine into an upright position. The triggerfish can wedge itself into small crevices and lock its spine to make it extremely difficult to get out. In addition, when fleeing from predators, the triggerfish will sometimes make grunting noises, possibly a call to warn other nearby triggerfish of danger at hand.
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One particularly interesting aspect of the fish's behavior is the ability to blow jets of water from its mouth. These jets help the fish find benthic invertebrates that may be buried under the substrate. Triggerfish can often been seen spitting sand from their mouths in order to sift through the material in search of edible detritus or organisms. Reef triggers are fairly aggressive and will generally not tolerate conspecific species in its general vicinity, thus the fish is often found solitary. This is particularly true in captivity. Triggers have the remarkable ability to rapidly alter their coloration. They can fade into a relatively drab appearance when sleeping or demonstrating submission while the coloration is often the most vivid when the fish is healthy and unthreatened by its surroundings.
Distribution
The reef triggerfish is distributed throughout the
Indo-Pacific region, and it's especially prominent in the
coral reefs of the
Hawaiian Islands.
Hawaii state fish
Due to an expiration of a Hawaiian state law, the trigger fish ceased to be the
state fish of
Hawaii in 1990. On April 17, 2006, bill HB1982 was presented to the
Governor of Hawaiʻi which permanently reinstated the reef triggerfish (humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa) as the state fish of Hawaiʻi. The bill passed into law on
May 2,
2006 and was effective upon its approval.
Humuhumunukunukuapuaʻa means "triggerfish with a pig-like short snout". It is not, as often claimed, the longest fish name in Hawaiian; that distinction belongs to
lauwiliwilinukunukuʻoiʻoi ("long-snouted fish shaped like a
wiliwili leaf"), the
butterflyfish Forcipiger longirostris. For the purposes of religious sacrifices, every land animal in the Hawaiian islands had an equivalent in the sea. The Humuhumunukunukuapua‘a was seen as equal to a pig.
Further Information
Get more info on 'Reef Triggerfish'.
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