Napoleonfish, or Humphead Wrasse nowdays is rare in most of the world, but it’s quite common to see it around diving spots in Raja Ampat.

Due to the illegal or destructive fishing and breeding the species for commercial profit made this specie on the list of endangered ones.

The Humphead Wrasse is from the family of Labridae, but being the biggest one of the wrasses. Male can reach up to 2,5 m, and females rarely reach more than 1m.

Like most of the wrasse family, Humphead has thick, flashy lips and specific hump form above the eyes. Male Humpheads have bright electric to green color, while females have red/orange above and red/orange to white color bellow.

Although the Humphead Wrasse lives very long- females up to 50 years, and males up to 45 years, their breeding rate is very slow, which is another reason that they became specie that is endangered.

The very interesting fact about most species of the Wrasse family is that they’re protogynous hermaphrodites, which basically means that organism that it’s born as a female changes sex into male.

For Humphead Wrasse this change may occur at age of 9. As they live in the surrounding of coral reefs, this specie is most often spotted in male-female pairs, or groups consisting from two to seven individuals.