Red-belted anthias

Amazing fact

The red-belted anthias is a fish that changes sex from female to male.

Museums Victoria

Red-belted anthias in its habitat (illustration)

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An illustration based on the real animal.

A little discovery to share.

The red-belted anthias is a fish that changes sex from female to male.

SourceMuseums Victoria — Lilac-tip Basslet, Pseudanthias rubrizonatus (Randall 1983)

THE REAL WORLD

The real Red-belted anthias

Scientific name: Pseudanthias rubrizonatus
Japanese name: アカオビハナダイ
Group: Ocean animals

Order: Perciformes
Family: Serranidae
Genus: Pseudanthias

Facts about the real animal.

It lives in Japanese seas from the Izu Peninsula to Kagoshima Bay, and around Taiwan, Hong Kong and the western Pacific.

鳥羽水族館 — アカオビハナダイ

It lives on rocky reefs and coral reefs along the coast.

鳥羽水族館 — アカオビハナダイ

Males have a red, band-like marking on their sides, but females do not.

鳥羽水族館 — アカオビハナダイ

How the Red-belted anthias lives

Young fish may live in bays and on silty reefs. It gathers around isolated coral heads and sunken ships. During the summer-to-autumn breeding season, males turn vivid colors.

Museums Victoria いおワールドかごしま水族館

Basic data

Range: Izu Peninsula, Sagami Bay, Suruga Bay, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Gulf of Tonkin, western Pacific, and elsewhere

鳥羽水族館

Where the Red-belted anthias has been recorded

Records: GBIF.org (CC0 and CC BY 4.0 records, retrieved 2026-11-07). Map: Natural EarthSee the records on GBIF

Watch wild animals from a distance. Do not touch or feed them, and take care of the places where they live.

Names around the world

日本語: アカオビハナダイ
简体中文: 红带拟花鮨
繁體中文: 紅帶擬花鮨
Français: Anthias coraline
Português (Brasil): Anthias-de-recife-profundo
Bahasa Indonesia: Ikan gadis belang-merah

Names come from Wikidata and iNaturalist records. Where a language has no recorded name, we use the scientific name.

Sources and how we check

鳥羽水族館 — アカオビハナダイChecked: 2026-11-04
いおワールドかごしま水族館 — アカオビハナダイChecked: 2026-11-07
Museums Victoria — Lilac-tip Basslet, Pseudanthias rubrizonatus (Randall 1983)Checked: 2026-11-07

We check each fact against its source. The illustrations simplify how the real animal looks.

The classification (class, order, family, genus) follows Wikidata records, checked against GBIF. Classifications can change as research goes on.

The basic data are the values given in each source. They vary with how the animal is measured, whether it is male or female, and whether it lives in the wild or in captivity.

This page was translated from the original Japanese with the help of AI.

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