Every couple of months the Marine Ranger will produce a fact sheet to help you learn more about a particular animal that can be found in the Reserve.

| Ballan Wrasse (Labrus bergylta) | Dead Men’s Fingers (Alcyonium digitatum) | Snake pipefish (Entelurus aequoreus) | Jewel Anemone (Corynactis viridis) | The Lumpsucker, lumpfish or sea hen (Cyclopterus lumpus) |

Ballan Wrasse (Labrus bergylta)

A fish that all divers have had close encounters with in the kelp forests or around the rocky reefs of the Reserve. A common sighting, and something that most divers probably all take for granted, but why not take a closer look, they are beautiful fish with an intriguing life history.

All ballan wrasse start life as females, hatching out of their nests of seaweed jammed into rock crevices. They then take about six years become sexually mature when they will start spawning, which they will do for a number of years before some, but not all, will turn into fully functioning males. Nobody really knows why this happens and why only some females change sex. And there is no external evidence of the sex change so no-one knows how they court and mate either.

Ballan wrasse are long-lived fish, they have to be to fit it all in I guess, with records of 25-year-old fish not unusual. They spend most of their lives alone, patrolling their territories looking out for their food of crabs and sea snails, especially mussels. Their penchant for such tough food means they have to have two sets of teeth – the normal ones in the mouth and an additional set in the throat.