🐠 Redfin Butterflyfish (Chaetodon lunulatus)
Marine Fish-Only Butterflyfish • Pink-Yellow Body With Purple Pinstripes • Genuine Extreme Corallivore — Please Read Before Buying
 
⚠️ Important Information — Please Read First
We want to be as genuinely direct as possible on this one. The Redfin Butterflyfish is an obligate corallivore, feeding almost exclusively on live stony coral polyps in the wild, and multiple authoritative sources report that without an ongoing supply of living coral, this species genuinely will not survive in a home aquarium — some experienced keepers and published references go as far as saying this species shouldn't be collected for the aquarium trade at all. A small number of dedicated keepers have reported gradual success transitioning young specimens onto enriched meaty foods with real patience, but this is genuinely inconsistent and cannot be relied upon. This is not a species we can responsibly recommend to anyone without direct, hands-on expert experience feeding this exact species and a genuine, realistic plan for what happens if it refuses substitute foods. Please speak with our team in detail before considering this purchase.
 
📋 The Redfin Butterflyfish, also called the Oval Butterflyfish or Pacific Pinstriped Butterflyfish, has a genuinely striking pink-to-yellow body crossed by fine oblique purple stripes, with the anal, dorsal, and caudal fins edged in black and warm red.
Native to shallow coral-rich lagoons, reef flats, and fore-reef slopes across the Indo-Pacific, from Indonesia to the Great Barrier Reef, French Polynesia, and Hawaii, this species is genuinely restricted almost entirely to areas with healthy, abundant coral growth.
 
💡 Highlights
🎨 Pink-Yellow Body With Purple Pinstripes: A genuinely striking, high-contrast pattern
🪸 Genuine Extreme Coral-Polyp Specialist: Feeds almost exclusively on live coral in the wild
⚠️ Not Reef Safe: Will consume stony coral polyps and other sessile invertebrates
🧠 Experts Only: Genuinely unsuitable for the vast majority of home aquariums
👀 Genuinely Rare in the Trade: Uncommon due to its extreme dietary specialisation