Odontanthias katayamai is yet another big story from the rare reef fish genus formerly known as Holanthias. A couple weeks ago we learned of a completely new deepwater anthias from Puerto Rico which is believed to belong to Odontanthias, and in the last few days Blue Harbor acquired an almost unknown species of deepwater reef fish, Odontanthias katayamai.
O. katayamai is so rare that the image above from Blue Harbor is probably the best photograph of a living specimen. This yellow-spotted anthias was collected around the deep reefs of Okinawa at a depth of 330ft/100m by Deep Sea Challengers, and it was brought up to the surface using a ‘special decompression technique’ which has been in development for ten years. Blue Harbor is currently keeping the Yellow Spot Anthias in a cool water quarantine aquarium with dim lighting and no tankmates while it acclimates to captive life. The video below shows the Odontanthias katayamai shortly after capture by Deep Sea Challengers.
[youtube width=”680″ height=”400″]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHGiZh4oTSs[/youtube]
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