Zebra sea bream - Diplodus cervinus
Finding Diplodus cervinus, Zebra sea bream, in the lower Ligurian Sea (or upper Tyrrhenian Sea) is a rather rare event and I would say very unusual, almost exceptional.
This species of Sea bream lives in warm waters and is quite common in the southern Mediterranean Sea but is practically very rare in more northern latitudes, except perhaps for some islands such as Elba and Capraia but it is always of a rare event.
I already had seen Zebra sea bream in the water but I was in Favignana an island of Italy belonging to the Egadi archipelago, in Sicily, so as soon as I saw it I had no doubts that it was another species of fish and to be witness of an event that should make us think a lot about the conditions of our sea.
The presence of this species in the coast of Livorno immediately makes me think of the umpteenth indication of the tropicalization of the Mediterranean Sea and of the constant and inevitable increase in the temperature of our seas. On this site we have often documented this phenomenon as the now annual presence of the northernmost nest in the Mediterranean of the Caretta caretta and reported the temperature anomalies of our seabed for which the explosion of the Mucilage is now a constant event that always occurs at seabeds. deeper where the sea temperature should be around 17 ° C in summer instead of 24/35 ° C.
Unfortunately the images and the video are not of good quality, since I met this fish as soon as it entered the water and therefore I was unable to approach it to film it in an acceptable way and not to scare it. In the following days I was able to meet him again and to have confirmation of his presence, but I was unable to photograph him, so I slowed down and enlarged the video to be able to see it better.
Zebra sea bream (Diplodus cervinus Lowe, 1838) is a marine bony fish belonging to the Sparidae family.
Description
The shape is similar to that of other white breams but the lips are larger. The color, on the other hand, is unmistakable: silver with 5-6 large black bands that reach almost to the belly, wider than the interposed clear spaces.
It is the giant among the Mediterranean bream and reaches up to 55 cm in length, weighing 2.7 kg.
Biology
Diet
Omnivorous species, it feeds on aquatic plants and small invertebrates.
Distribution and habitat
It is a widespread species in the north-eastern Atlantic Ocean and in the Mediterranean Sea; it is much more widespread along the North African coasts than the European ones. In Italy it is rare, it is slightly more common in Sicily.
It lives on rocky bottoms up to about 200 m.
https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diplodus_cervinus
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diplodus_cervinus
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