Common Name: Melanesian Melanopus Anemonefish
Scientific Name: Amphiprion monofasciatus Thiollière 1857
Distribution: Melanesia, from Papua New Guinea to the Solomon Islands, probably into neighboring regions of West Papua and the Coral Sea.
Type Locality: Woodlark Island, Papua New Guinea
Identification: Single stripe. Ventral fins black. Both sexes with black well-developed along the back and sides.
Similar: Essentially identical to the true A. melanopus of Indonesia and the Micronesian and Samoan A. cf melanopus, and separated here only because of biogeography. The Australian A. verweyi is typically brighter in color and with the caudal peduncle and posterior anal fin orange (though this varies within the population). The Vanuatu and New Caledonian A. arion is much brighter and has relatively little black along the body, as well as having sexually dichromatic pelvic fins and an orange anal fin.
Notes: There is little obvious difference between this fish and its relatives in Indonesia and Melanesia, but it is presumed that these differ, at least genetically. It’s impossible to know how far west this population extends until a thorough investigation into the population genetics of these fishes is completed. The taxon is based on a drawing, apparently without any associated specimen. Google translates it as follows: “We have before our eyes only a drawing of this second species of Amphiprion, to which M. Montrouzier has not attached any distinctive epithet either. The one we apply to it indicates that the anterior band is the only one that exists; the zones which encircle the middle of the body and surround the tail of the preceding are not indicated here. The whole trunk is deep black, except the underside of the belly which is grey; the ventrals and the anal are grey-black; the pectorals, the dorsal and the caudal of an orange red; the head is also of the same color, except for the white stripe without a black border which passes behind the eye. The contours, moreover, have nothing to distinguish the species from the preceding one.”
Taxonomy Note: This species was treated as a synonym of Amphiprion melanopus in Allen 1991 and subsequent references. The elevation to full species status used in this classification should be considered provisional until a full taxonomic revision is published.
Amphiprionology 