Find a Fish

Chevroned Butterflyfish
Chaetodon trifascialis Quoy & Gaimard, 1825

A Chevroned Butterflyfish at a depth of 20m, Northern Small Detached Reef, far northern Great Barrier Reef, Queensland December 2001. View larger image.

The Chevroned Butterflyfish has a white body with black chevron markings on the side. A black bar passes through the eye and the caudal fin is black with a yellow margin.

Juvenile Chevroned Butterflyfish are similar to the adults, except they have a yellow caudal fin and a black bar across the rear of the body.

This species grows to 18cm in length.

Chevroned Butterflyfish typically inhabit inshore and offshore coral reefs and lagoons. This fish is often seen as a solitary individual or in pairs associated with Staghorn coral Acropora spp.

It is found in depths from 2m to 30m.

This fish is highly territorial and will defend its territory from other coral-eating butterflyfishes and members of its own species. The territory of each male includes the territories of two or three females. Pairs of the Chevroned Butterflyfish spawn during the new and full moons.

The Chevroned Butterflyfish feeds on the mucous and polyps of the Acropora coral within its territory.

It occurs in tropical marine waters of the Indo-West and Central Pacific, from East Africa, north to Japan, south to Australia and east to the Society Islands.

In Australia it is known from the south-western coast of Western Australia, around the tropical north of the country, and south to the central coast of New South Wales.

View a map of the collecting localities of specimens in the Australian Museum Fish Collection.

Find a Fish

Chevroned Butterflyfish Chaetodon trifascialis Quoy & Gaimard, 1825

Further reading

Chevroned Butterflyfish
Chaetodon trifascialis Quoy & Gaimard, 1825