Damselfish ID

Caught in Sarasota

The Damsel looks real similar to a Damsel I caught in the keys that was ID'd as a Longfin Damselfish, but I saw pictures of Dusky Damselfish and Beau Gregory that look like this too

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I grew up in Sarasota, now in Gainesville for grad school, and have seen all three of those species plus cocoa damselfish while snorkeling in New Pass. The cocoas were by far the most abundant with an occasional spotting of one of the others. Cocoas almost always have a saddle/spot on the caudal peduncle, but from the picture it's hard to tell if this fish has that or not (it can be hard to see when they are darker like this one). The eyespot of the juvenile Beau Gregory usually persists into adulthood, although it is smaller and not lined by blue. Again, doesn't look like this one has that, but hard to tell in darker individuals. Dorsal and anal fins don't look quite long enough to be a longfn, so I'm leaning towards dusky but hard to tell for sure. Check out this link from REEF to help divers try to ID these four similar colored damsels during fish surveys: http://www.reef.org/...rison_chart.pdf

Thanks for the insight associatedboy, I have a slightly better pic but i couldnt attach it because file size was too big. I definately dont see any saddle/spot on it, so I'm leaning Dusky too.

Now that you mention the fins not being long enough to be a Longfin Damselfish in the Keys, I went back and looked at the fish I had indentified as a Longfin Damsel and I'm pretty sure it is not a Longfin, it looks like it might be the same fish that I just caught in Sarasota, here is a picture of it.

So would you agree the below fish is not a Longfin Damselfish, and is probably the same fish I caught in Sarasota?

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I would tend to say that both of these are dusky damselfish as it appear that the anal and dorsal find do not extend past the base of the caudal fin. The longfin is supposed to have a blue edge on the anal fin and the dusky a dark edge on the anal fin. However, from what I've seen in from various sources, it appears that the dusky may also have a blue edge on the anal fin.

Thanks associateboy, leaning that way too, they both appear quite duskyish

It turned out both of these fish are in fact Beaugregory Damelfish, identified by reef fish expert Mr. Paul Humann