HETEROGENEITY IN HABITAT CHOICE IN CARDINALFISH COMMUNITY STRUCTURE

Between 1970-81, 379 small rotenone stations were made in the Gulf of Honduras. Of these, 160 were stations where the rotenone worked well and that had one or more species of apogonids. These stations resulted in a total of 3680 individuals and 17 (possibly 18) species in three genera. Detrended correspondence analysis failed to recognize any assemblages corresponding to specific habitats. There were, however, relationships between greatest abundance of some species at specific depths and habitats. The results for the apogonids are contrasted to that for the blennioid fishes from the same collections, where 11 distinctive assemblages associated with specific habitats were definable. These results clearly demonstrate that different groups of fishes within the coral-reef biome are affected by different assemblage structure control mechanisms.