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Cleaner wrasse — printable fact sheet
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Animal Fact Sheet
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Cleaner wrasse
Labroides dimidiatus
The cleaner wrasse runs a business. It sets up at a fixed location on the reef — a cleaning station — and larger fish queue there voluntarily, holding still, opening their mouths and gill covers, while the wrasse swims inside and picks off parasites, dead skin and debris. Predat…
Did you know?
- Cleaner wrasses are so trusted that even predatory fish allow them to clean inside their mouths without harming them.
- It runs a cleaning station where predators queue up and hold still while it swims into their mouths — and they never eat it. It cheats, preferring to eat the client's mucus over its parasites, and manages its reputation by behaving better when other fish are watching. It soothes an annoyed client by massaging it with its fins. In a landmark experiment it appeared to pass the mirror self-recognition test.
What I learned
Draw the cleaner wrasse
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