Beaugregory, Stegastes leucostictus

Beaugregory, Stegastes leucostictus, Juvenile. Fish caught from coastal waters off Big Pine Key, Florida, March 2019. Length:  7.9 cm (3.1 inches). Catch, photograph and identification courtesy of Luke Ovgard, Klamath Falls, Oregon.

Beaugregory, Stegastes leucostictus, Juvenile. Fish caught from coastal waters off Caye Ambergris, Belize, June 2013. Length: 10 cm (3.9 inches). Catch, photograph and identification courtesy of Eli (obsessiveangling.wordpress.com).

Beaugregory, Stegastes leucostictus. Fish caught from coastal waters off Caye Ambergris, Belize, June 2013. Length: 12 cm (4.7 inches). Catch, photograph, and identification courtesy of Josh Leisen (joshadventures.com), Gaylord, Michigan.

The Beaugregory, Stegastes leucostictus, is a member of the Damselfish or Pomacentridae Family, and is known in Mexico as jaqueta bonita. Globally, there are forty species in the genus Stegastes, of which eleven are found in Mexican waters, seven in the Atlantic and four in the Pacific Ocean.

The Beaugregory has an elongated, oval, deep, compressed body with a depth that is 45% to 49% of standard length. The males and females are similar in color and stature and can only be separated via courtship behavior while mating. Adults vary in color and can have heads, bodies, and fins that are gray brown with yellow spots on the scales of the upper back, small blue spots evenly distributed over most of the head and body, three spotted blue lines along the base, center and margin of the dorsal fin, and the anal fin has a blue margin. Most have a small black and blue ocellus in the middle at the rear of the dorsal fin. Alternatively, their snout, nape and upper back can be grayish-black and the remainder of the head, body and fins are bright yellow with blue markings. The Juveniles are bright yellow with a dark bluish-gray head, blue lines on the snout that extends through the eye and onto the upper back; they have a black ocellus in the middle at the rear of the dorsal fin. Their head has a blunt pointed snout with a small terminal protrusible mouth that opens in the front equipped with a single row of long and close-set teeth. Their anal fin has 2 spines and 12 to 14 rays; their caudal fin is bluntly forked with rounded lobes; their dorsal fin has 12 spines and 13 to 16 rays; and, they have 17 to 19 pectoral fin rays. They have 7 to 9 gill rakers on their lower arch. Their body is covered with large rough scales. Their lateral line is incomplete and ends under the dorsal fin base.

The Beaugregory is a tropical non-migratory demersal fish that is found within shallow inshore coral and rocky reefs, seagrass beds, sandy areas and around mangroves and sponge beds, at depths up to 15 m (49 feet). They reach a maximum of 12 cm (4.7 inches) in length. They can be found in close proximity with the Bicolor Damselfish, Stegastes partitus, and the Three-spot Damselfish, Stegastes planifrons. They are highly aggressive and strong territorial living in permanent homes in solitude rarely traveling more than 2 meters. They are diurnal omnivores that consume brown microalgae and cyanobacteria, amphipods, foraminiferans, gastropods, and marine worms. Juvenile damsels fed mainly on small invertebrates such as copepods and polychaetes. Reproduction is oviparous with pairing of individuals and can occur year-round. The nest site consists of empty shells or under stones or shells that are utilized by multiple females and may contain up to 25,000 sticky substrate adhering eggs. The males will fertilize and then guard the nest providing fanning to oxygenate the bright yellow eggs, removal of dead eggs, and protection from predation. The eggs hatch in 3 to 7 days. The eggs are subject to heavy predation by intruders. The hatched larvae become pelagic until they settle out in an appropriate environment. The Beaugregory is poorly studied with very limited information available about their lifestyle and behavioral patterns including specific details on age, growth, longevity, movement patterns, diet, habitat use, and reproduction.

The Beaugregory is a resident of all Mexican waters of the Atlantic Ocean including the Gulf of Mexico, with the exception that they are absent from north to Tuxpan, Veracruz, and the east coast of the Yucatán Peninsula in the Caribbean.

The Beaugregory can be difficult to identify due to its similarity in appearance with the juveniles of other damselfish including the Bicolor Damselfish, Stegastes partitus (head and body without spotting), the Cocoa Damselfish, Stegastes xanthurus (head and body without spotting), and the Longfin Damselfish, Stegastes diencaeus (deeper body; 2 blue lines above the eye), and, from the Atlantic and with the juvenile Beaubrummel, Stegastes flavilatus (head and body without spotting) from the Pacific. They are the only Damselfish that has 12 dorsal spines and can be easily identified on this basis.

From a conservation perspective the Beaugregory is currently considered to be of Least Concern with stable, widely distributed populations. Juveniles are consumed by the invasive Red Lionfish, Pterois volitans, but at present not at a level to affect global populations. They are popular with the aquarium trade as they small in size and beautiful in color, however they often fight with other fish and lose their colors as they mature. They are an incidental catch of subsistence fishermen being caught with nets and traps and retained for human consumption.