Blue-green damselfish

Amazing fact

Male blue-green chromis move their tail fins to fan fertilized eggs.

Oregon Coast Aquarium

Blue-green damselfish in its habitat (illustration)

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An illustration based on the real animal.

A little discovery to share.

Male blue-green chromis move their tail fins to fan fertilized eggs.

SourceOregon Coast Aquarium — Blue-green Chromis

THE REAL WORLD

The real Blue-green damselfish

Scientific name: Chromis viridis
Japanese name: デバスズメダイ
Group: Ocean animals

Order: Blenniiformes
Family: Pomacentridae
Genus: Chromis

Facts about the real animal.

It lives in schools around branching corals in the western Pacific, from Amami Ōshima southward.

沖縄美ら海水族館 — デバスズメダイ

Its whole body is a pale blue-green. Its Japanese name comes from the teeth that stick forward from its lower jaw.

沖縄美ら海水族館 — デバスズメダイ

It eats zooplankton and other tiny food. When it senses danger, the whole school darts into gaps in the coral at once.

沖縄美ら海水族館 — デバスズメダイ鳥羽水族館 — デバスズメダイ

How the Blue-green damselfish lives

At spawning time, a male prepares a nest where females lay their eggs. Newly hatched young float and drift with the current. As they grow, the young settle on a reef and become adults. At night, it sleeps hidden inside a clump of coral.

Oregon Coast Aquarium Nausicaá

Basic data

Diet: Zooplankton and other food
Range: South of Amami Oshima and the western Pacific

沖縄美ら海水族館

Where the Blue-green damselfish has been recorded

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

Where it livesJapan World oceans Coral reefs

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: デバスズメダイ
简体中文: 蓝绿光鳃鱼
繁體中文: 藍綠光鰓魚
한국어: 그린크로미스
Español: Damisela verde
Français: Chromis vert
Deutsch: Grünes Schwalbenschwänzchen
Português (Brasil): Donzela-esverdeada
Italiano: Damigella verde
العربية: جريين كروميس
Bahasa Indonesia: Betok hijau

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

Sources and how we check

沖縄美ら海水族館 — デバスズメダイChecked: 2026-11-03
鳥羽水族館 — デバスズメダイChecked: 2026-11-03
Oregon Coast Aquarium — Blue-green ChromisChecked: 2026-11-07
Nausicaá — La demoiselle bleu-vertChecked: 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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