Family Mullidae
Goatfishes (Chivos, salmonetes)

Family Mullidae

Goatfishes possess a perch-like body that superficially resembles a mullet.  The key characteristic to identification of this family is the presence of a long pair of barbels on the chin.  While swimming, the barbels fold along the chin for streamlining, but when searching for food, extend perpendicularly to the chin.  These barbels are believed to have both taste and touch receptors along their length.  The barbels are inserted into the sand and flicked along the surface to detect the presence of the crustaceans, mollusks, worms and fishes that comprise their diet. 

While there are fifty-five species of goatfishes worldwide, only two are represented within the Sea of Cortez, and scuba divers commonly observe only one species.  Absent in the northern Gulf, the Mexican goatfish, Mulloidichthys dentatus, begins its northern range near Guaymas and San Carlos and becomes increasingly abundant as one moves south to Cabo San Lucas.  Outside of the Gulf it ranges from southern California to Peru and the Galapagos Islands. 

Usually found along rocky reefs, it feeds mainly at night. However, goatfishes are commonly active during diurnal hours as well, and maybe observed alternating between cruising the sand flats in search of food, and enjoying the cleaning services offered by butterfly fish and barberfish.  The other Sea of Cortez goatfish is the red goatfish, Pseudupeneus grandi squamis.   The red goatfish lives at deeper depths and has been observed by the author only at depths exceeding two hundred and fifty feet although it is reported to inhabit reefs as shallow as one hundred and fifty feet.