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Gonadal development and infrequent sex change in a population of the humbug damselfish, Dascyllus aruanus, in continuous coral-cover habitat

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Abstract

The expression of protogyny often differs among populations of a single species. The humbug damselfish, Dascyllus aruanus (Linnaeus), typically lives in spatially discrete groups of several individuals around live coral colonies and has been reported to be protogynous. The size and sexual composition of groups of this species, however, vary with the size of the coral patch or the degree of coral cover. The present study examined gonadal development and sexual pattern in a population of D. aruanus living in continuous coral-cover habitat. Fish were collected in Tumon Bay, Guam (13°31′N; 144°47′E), during a 2-week period in July and August 1996. Reflecting their distributions, small fish (n=54) were collected at depths of 1–2 m over continuous Porites spp. patches, and large fish (n=56) were collected at depths of 2–3 m over a continuous Acropora spp. patch. Gonadal development was examined histologically. Gonads of D. aruanus first developed an ovarian lumen and primary-growth stage oocytes. From this ovarian state or from more developed ovaries with cortical-alveolus stage oocytes, some gonads developed into testes through degeneration of oocytes and development of spermatogenic tissue. Developing spermatogenic tissue only occurred in gonads having pre-cortical alveolus stage oocytes, and the size of individuals with gonads of this type overlapped mainly with the size range of individuals with gonads containing only pre-vitellogenic oocytes (i.e. immature females). This suggested that functional female-to-male sex change was rare or absent in this population of D. aruanus. Moreover, the different habitat distributions of small and large fish suggest that sex determination in immature fish occurs in the absence of adults.

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Acknowledgements

I am deeply indebted to the researchers and staff of the Marine Station, University of Guam, for their assistance and support in every aspect of the fieldwork. I am also grateful to R.S. Haley and G.S. Losey, Jr. for logistic and moral support, T. Yoshikawa for field assistance and preparation of picture plates, M. Kent, M.C. Rigby, and W.F. Font for information on CUE, M. Kasuya for help in histological processing, J.R. Godwin and K.S. Cole for information on gonadal development in Dascyllus spp., S. Robinow for equipment access, and the members of the Aquatic Ecology Laboratory, The Ohio State University, for their support. I thank J. Stimson, G. Steinhart, and G.M. Kilbane for reviewing an earlier draft and the revision of the manuscript, and two anonymous referees for their thorough review and valuable comments on the manuscript. The field collection and laboratory processing parts of this study were supported by a fieldwork scholarship from the East–West Center, a Hawaii Audubon Society Research Grant, a Raney Award from the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists, a Sigma Xi Grants-in-Aid of Research Award, and an International Women's Fishing Association Scholarship, and the Department of Zoology at the University of Hawaii. I was supported by a university postdoctoral fellowship from The Ohio State University during examination of the slides and writing of the manuscript. This research was approved by the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee of the University of Hawaii.

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  1. K. Asoh

    Present address: Aquatic Ecology Laboratory, Department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology, The Ohio State University, 1314 Kinnear Road, Columbus, OH 43212-1156, USA

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  1. Department of Zoology and Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA

    K. Asoh

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Communicated by J.P. Grassle, New Brunswick

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Asoh, K. Gonadal development and infrequent sex change in a population of the humbug damselfish, Dascyllus aruanus, in continuous coral-cover habitat. Marine Biology 142, 1207–1218 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00227-003-1051-6

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