Fish coloration

Fish coloration, a subset of animal coloration, is extremely diverse. Fish across all taxa vary greatly in their coloration through special mechanisms, mainly pigment cells called chromatophores.[1] Fish can have any colors of the visual spectrum on their skin, evolutionarily derived for many reasons. There are three factors to coloration, brightness (intensity of light), hue (mixtures of wavelengths), and saturation (the purity of wavelengths).[2] Fish coloration has three proposed functions: thermoregulation, intraspecific communication, and interspecific communication.[3] Fishes' diverse coloration is possibly derivative of the fact that "fish most likely see colors very differently than humans".[4]

  1. ^ Cite error: The named reference :5 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  2. ^ The diversity of fishes : biology, evolution, and ecology. Helfman, Gene S., Helfman, Gene S. (2nd ed.). Chichester, UK: Blackwell. 2009. ISBN 978-1-4051-2494-2. OCLC 233283748.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  3. ^ Endler, John A. (1978), "A Predator's View of Animal Color Patterns", in Hecht, Max K.; Steere, William C.; Wallace, Bruce (eds.), Evolutionary Biology, Springer US, pp. 319–364, doi:10.1007/978-1-4615-6956-5_5, ISBN 978-1-4615-6956-5
  4. ^ "Significance of colors and patterns of coral reef fishes: an overview". ReefCI. Retrieved 2020-04-28.