Friday Fish Time

Common name: Blue tang (among others). Scientific name: Paracanthurus hepatus. Family: Acanthuridae. Image: Flickr/Silvio Tanaka

Stop yelling ‘that’s Dory!’ at the screen, people are laughing.

The beautiful and googly-eyed blue tang goes by many other names (regal tang, hippo tang, palette surgeonfish) and is found throughout the Indo-Pacific. In Australian waters your best chance of spotting them is around the Great Barrier Reef, although they are relatively uncommon and highly localised.

One interesting fact about this species is that they can make themselves semi-transparent when faced with danger or dark spaces.

The blue tang found worldwide fame in 2003, with the release of Disney’s Finding Nemo. Blue tang ‘Dory’ is the ditzy sidekick… but we’ll just let the video do the explaining:

Giggling yet? Our job here is done.

PS. Dory’s amnesia is a reference to the myth that fish only have a three-second memory. Yes, it’s a myth.