Fish in Hawaii and the Indo-Pacific Region

The Indo-Pacific region stretches from the shores of East Africa to the islands of the Pacific and includes the most vast and diverse tropical marine fauna in the world (Tinker, 1982). The Hawaiian Islands, a chain of more than 107 individual volcanoes (Clague, 1989) is a district of this region’s western sphere that rims the species divide between the Pacific islands and the region’s eastern American shores. While those marine species that are called Indo-West-Pacific can be found uniformly in their specific habitats, many species are exclusive to particular areas within the region. Fish endemic to Hawaiian waters, a classification that often includes Hawaii’s closest neighbor, Johnston Island, makes up 30 per cent of its reef and inshore fish population and, like the milletseed butterflyfish or the saddle wrasse, are often the most abundant type of fish found within a genus or family. The success of these native fish species is probably the consequence of long periods of adaptation to an environment that is uniquely isolated from the rest of the world. Most of these species are obvious derivatives of an Indo-Pacific ancestor, but sometimes have characteristics whose evolution is so subtle that they straddle the subspecies fence (Randall, 1985).

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