Warm water marine ID's needed

I was trying to ID fish seen on my carribean trip, but I have a few who trouble me.

first ones I photographed in the wild.

These blue guys hung around docks in the bahamas picking food off the surface



These next few pics are from St Thomas. Is this a Mojarra? I think so but am not sure. they love open sandy areas



some kind of needlefish or maybe a half beak



not sure what this is, looks like a parrot fish but none in my carribean fish guide have a grey color



no idea what these little guys hanging below the rock are

I can't find anything that looks this pickerel like in my guide



can't quite ID this either, nothing i can find has its distinctive markings



Is this a blue tang (odd, didn't notice the odd looking thing at his back when I took the picture)



not sure on these two either, the lower one has very obvious scales

these last few may be too blurred to ID

Can a fish be IDed from a silouette?



or a top down view?



or a yellow blur (these guys were all throughout the mossy stuff)



I also saw two mottled brown baby bass like fish after my camera batteries ran out, they even squabbled like sunfish, I wish I got photos to have them IDed

Finally St Maarten, starting with another needlefish or halfbeak




not sure if anything in this mixed school can be IDed, the black and white ones look like sergeant majors.



I have one or two ID's I want from the Atlantis Resort aquarium but those will come later as I am more sure of them (fish photographed through glass seem easier to ID but a couple I am unsure of my IDing skills on)

First post: first one might be a rainbow runner. Fourth one looks like an Atlantic Blue Tang to me.
Second post: First (and possibly second) pictures look like a Slippery Dick wrasse. Third picture again looks like an atlantic blue tang to me.
Third post: First picture is some sort of juvenile angelfish I think. Or an adult cherub angelfish. Third picture looks like maybe a citron goby (I'm unsure of their range, but from tropical fish experience, the look and I think the habitat make sense) And the last picture the banded fish are almost certainly Sergent Majors. I'm looking at one in my tank right now.

First post, first photo looks like a bar jack, second photo is a mojarra, third photo looks like a ballyhoo, forth looks more like an ocean surgeonfish (tang) than a blue to me. Fifth photo is a tough one, but they look like a mixed bag of grunts.
Second post: first and second photo - certainly a wrasse, young slippery dick sounds good to me, third photo is a blue tang (look at the difference in head shape from the one in the first post) with a cleaner goby, forth photo has some type of grunt in the middle left, I can't make out enough of the others.
Third post: Small angel of some kind or a damselfish, but they are tough to id when small like that; forth photo likely a needlefish; last photo the striped fish are sergent majors, maybe some other damselfish with them.

The Carribean is a spectacular place to watch fish. You will see most of these same fish in the Florida Keys.

Thank you for the ID help, it helped alot (the search feature on my iPads fishes of the carribean ap sucks, sometimes I select a fish by color and location and it shows no results despite finding a fish their. searches for color and size is similar as by size it was made with the assumption the fish you see are large adults of the species). now for help with aquarium fishes from Atlantis. Somer were easy to ID, some the guide pointed out, but their were no ID keys here and sometimes I fell behind waiting for crowds to clear so I can take photos and missed the guides talk.

Are these big grey basslike fish cubera snapper?



Is this a Nassau and a Black Grouper




Is this a margate?



Is this a Royal Gramma?

Is this a mix of school masters and ocean surgeons?



French grunt?



is this an ocean triggerfish?



Is this a doctorfish



anyone have any idea of what this guy is?

Last pic of your...fouth post is not a royal gramma, but a spanish hogfish.
First pic of your fifth post is correct I believe. Third one is a triggerfish. I think the fourth one is a doctorfish, but I've always been confused by that common name seeing as how the name for the entire family is surgeonfish or tang. Either way it is an Acanthurid.

The first photo of your second set of posts: Those look like some sort of grunt, probably a very old white grunt or a Sailor's Choice.
Second photo: top is a black grouper, bottom is a nassau
Third photo: can't really tell, but body shape suggests margate
Forth photo: spanish hogfish as previously noted

Third post: First photo: schoolmaster sounds right, but I can't tell what the surgeon fish are.
Second photo: french grunt sounds good, but can't be positive from photo
Third photo: yes, ocean triggerfish
Fourth photo: yes, doctorfish
Fifth: not enough to go on

These photos obviously came from a public aquarium, so that makes all of this more difficult. As you are already noticing, as you travel around the Caribbean there are a lot of similar-looking fish that are difficult to separate without knowing where they came from. All of my IDs come from my experience in Florida and little bit of the Bahamas, so if these fish came from, say, Cayman, I could be way off. As Knaus noted, the names get confusing too; in some places grunts and porgies are commonly called snappers.

I use two books when I am in Florida: Reef Fish Indentification - Florida Caribean Bahamas by Paul Humann, and new one I just picked up called A Field Guide to Coastal Fishes from Maine to Texas by Kells and Carpenter. Both available on Amazon. I've used Paul Humann's book for years, but if I could only have one I would choose Kells and Carpenter. It's more comprenensive and it uses drawings for illustrations instead of photos, which I prefer.

Tropical marines are fun and can be challenging. Good luck with your adventures.

Sorry to post on this topic again, but I was uploading vacation pics to facebook and found two fish pics I missed from my snorkling

hopefully once these are IDed I can correct my album labels and do a trip report. I wish I could have someone go through my photo album and correct all the misidentified shiners.

Not sure from the angle if this is the brown one that reminded me of a baby bass in shape.



not sure if this is the same as the yellow blurry one above or not

Edited by FirstChAoS, 20 June 2012 - 11:47 AM.

5th photo may be a tomtate grunt

Most of these have been answered already, but I'll add mine

1 - bar jack (Caranx ruber)
2 - yellowfin mojarra (Gerres cinereus)
3 - ballyhoo (Hemiramphus brasiliensis)
4 - ocean surgeon (Acanthurus bahianus)
5 - mixed grunt school (Haemulan sp.) - french grunt (H. flavolineatum) is definitely in there
6 - slippery dick (Halichoeres bivittatus)
7 - juvenile parrotfish (Sparisoma sp.)
8 - blue tang (Acanthurus coeruleus) - the fish with it may be a cleaner goby (Elacatinus sp.)
9 - a school of grunts, mahogany snapper (Lutjanus mahogani) and yellowtail parrotfish (Sparisoma rubripinne)
10 - damselfish (Stegastes sp.)
11 - ???
12 - bucktooth parrotfish (Sparisoma radians)
13 - needlefish (either Strongylura or Tylosurus)
14 - sergeant major (Abudefduf saxatilus) is the only one identifiable
15 - the one in the center is a margate (Haemulan album) the other has a snapper-like tail and could be a cubera
16 - yup, nassau and black grouper
17 - maybe a margate, pic is not clear enough
18 - spanish hogfish (Bodianus rufus)
19 - yup, schoolmasters, the surgeons look more like doctorfish to me
20 - ocean triggerfish
21 - doctorfish
22 - tomtate (Haemulon aurolineatum)
23 - can't really tell, maybe a juvenile parrotfish
24 - looks like a very young blue tang

Agree with MichiJim - I highly recommend Paul Humann's books, they are the best thing out there for underwater marine fish ID