Coral Beauty Angelfish

Centropyge bispinosa

Also known as Twospined Angelfish, Dusky Angelfish

SaltwaterFish

Coral Beauty Angelfish (Centropyge bispinosa) — Jenny (JennyHuang) from Taipei · CC BY 2.0

Care at a glance

Temperature: 72–79°F (22–26°C)
pH: 8.1–8.4
Adult size: 3.9 in (10 cm)
Minimum tank: 50 gal (190 L)
Temperament: Mostly peaceful
Social behavior: Solitary
Swim level: Middle
Difficulty: Easy
Breeding: Hard
Rarity: Very common
Reef safe: Reef safe with caution
Origin: Indo-Pacific, from East Africa and the Red Sea across to the central Pacific
Family: Pomacanthidae

Overview

A grazer that spends its day working the rockwork for algae and small organisms, so it needs an established tank with good algae growth and several small meaty and algae-based feedings a day. It is usually peaceful but will defend its patch, and it tends to fight other dwarf angels unless the tank is large. Best kept as the only Centropyge in the system. Reef keepers rate it caution: many individuals leave corals alone, but some nip LPS polyps, zoanthids, soft corals, or clam mantles, and there is no way to guarantee which you get.

In the wild

Lives on rocky and coral-rich reef slopes, usually between about 5 and 45 meters deep. It sticks close to cover, darting between crevices and rubble where it grazes algae and picks at the film that grows over rock. In the tank it wants the same thing: plenty of live rock with caves and overhangs to duck into and mature surfaces to graze.

Good to know

Centropyge bispinosa is a dwarf angel in the family Pomacanthidae. Like others in the genus it is a protogynous hermaphrodite, meaning fish mature first as females and the dominant individual can change into a male. It reaches roughly 10 cm and is one of the hardier dwarf angels, which is a big part of why it is so widely kept.

Did you know

It is one of the most color-variable dwarf angels, ranging from deep purple-blue with an orange midsection to almost fully orange depending on where it was collected.