goby id?

[jw]

anyone know what species these are? about an inch long and can climb vertically using pectorals

[polaris]

mite be a painted goby jw,,,or a dragonet,,,

[dan belfast]

sand goby or some type of butterfish( get them while collecting bait) maybe, not a dragonet

[Al and Jordan]

a bit hard to tell from the pics man. but if you notice the dorsal fin is a continous fin with no break in it. so that rules out all the goby species as the black, rock, leopard spot, sand, two spotted and painted gobys all have to seperate dorsal fins. so that would bring us to the blenny family of fish. but all the following species have an appendage above each eye and from what i can see in the pics yours has'nt. so that rules out these blennys. butterfly, tompot and montagu's. that only really leaves us with 2 contenders who have a blunt head with no appendages. the viviparous blenny and a shanny. the viviparous blenny has reduced pelvic fins in front of the pectorals and a long tapered body similar in shape to a gunnel (butterfish). so that rules him out. so i'd guess that by process of elimination that only leaves us with a shanny as it's the only species left with that distinctive sharply rising snout with a pronounced brow over the eye with no tenticles or appendages. i'll add a few pics of different shanny's we've caught that shows the differing colours they come in as the males become darker during the breeding season from a greeny yellow to almost black.
just as a note for any future refrence between the goby and blenny famalies the following applies to blenny's.

" this large group of fishes has a large number of representives. they lack scales, and their bodies are typically long and rounded in section. they bear superficial similarity to the gobies, but can be destinguished because:
1. their pelvic fins, which are set well in front of pectorals, consist of a few rays only and are not united to form a ventral sucker as in the gobies yet they can still grip to and climb vertical rocks within the splash, and intertidal zones.
2. gobies have scales.
3.the dorsal fin is usually single but may be divided into 2 lobes by a notch or dip whereas in the gobies the 1st dorsal fin is clearly seperated from the second dorsal fin.

[Al and Jordan]

some shanny pics

[Al and Jordan]

some more shanny pics

[Al and Jordan]

last pic

[jw]

thanks for those helpful replies, the children have caught loads of them in rock pools.
they are as hard as nails, lasting for ages. they seem to climb up out
of the water and hold on to the box, can they breath out of water?
here is another pic of the same species, ( dorsal fin now folded down )

[Al and Jordan]

no probs jw. not sure if they can breathe out of water but they are as hard as nails. all of the shannys in the pics i put up are adults. but we see loads of the small ones that you seem to be gettin sticking close to the big ones. but when we fish for them we're using size 4 hooks. so the little guys do'nt stand a chance of getting hooked but they will still fearlessly attack the baited hooks . gotta admire their bravery

[jw]

been reading up about them here

http://www.glaucus.org.uk/Blenny.htm

habitually leaves oxygen-deficient pools and can be seen basking on rocks and completely out of the water at low tide

In medieval times, this fish, known as a Sea Frog, was used as one of the ingredients, with eggs, in hair shampoo, in Italy (related species) and France. (Source: researcher into medieval recipes.)

[Al and Jordan]

great link there jw interesting to read that one of their main predators is bass!! i have been told in the past that people have used them as conger bait, but never bass