🐠 Jewel Damsel (Stegastes lacrymatus)
Marine Reef-Safe Damsel • Dark Blue-Black Juvenile With Electric Blue Spots to Brown Adult With Yellow Tail • Genuinely Requires Aggressive Tank Mates • Beginner-Friendly Marine Fish
 
📋 We want to be genuinely upfront about naming: "Jewel Damsel" is a common name shared with a distinct, unrelated Western Atlantic species, Microspathodon chrysurus. This listing refers to Stegastes lacrymatus, also known as the Whitespotted Devil, native to the Indo-Pacific.
 
📋 The Jewel Damsel undergoes a genuinely dramatic colour transformation — juveniles have a dark blue-to-black body scattered with bright electric blue spots, while adults become a dark brown with a golden eye and a yellow tail.
Native to a genuinely wide range across the Indo-Pacific, this species inhabits lagoon patch reefs and outer reef slopes at depths of roughly 1 to 40 metres, feeding on algae and benthic invertebrates.
This is a genuinely hardy, easy-to-keep species that's fully reef safe, but we want to be honest that it becomes genuinely aggressive once established, and is documented as needing to be housed only with robust, similarly aggressive tank mates such as dottybacks, hawkfish, large wrasses, large angelfish, surgeonfish, or triggerfish. It will genuinely pester and bully more peaceful species, so please plan tank mates carefully. It should be kept singly, one per tank.
 
🔵🟤 Highlights
🎨 Dramatic Juvenile-to-Adult Colour Change: Electric blue-spotted juvenile to brown, yellow-tailed adult
🌿 Fully Reef Safe: Won't harm corals or invertebrates
⚠️ Genuinely Requires Aggressive Tank Mates: Will pester and bully more peaceful fish
💪 Genuinely Hardy: Easy to keep well fed and disease-resistant
🔍 Genuine Naming Overlap: Distinct from the unrelated Atlantic Jewel Damselfish