Common Goby
Pomatoschistus microps
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The tiny fish in the rockpool that vanishes the instant your shadow falls on it.
A small, slender, sandy-coloured fish with fine dark speckling, two dorsal fins and — the family's defining feature — pelvic fins fused into a suction disc on the underside. Common gobies live in the shallow, muddy and sandy margins of the Solway, in estuary pools, saltmarsh creeks and brackish ditches, and tolerate a wide range of salinity.
Behaviour
Gobies rest on the bottom rather than swimming freely, using the pelvic sucker to hold position, and dart in short bursts before settling again. They feed on small crustaceans and worms. Males guard eggs laid on the underside of a shell or stone, fanning them until they hatch. Their tolerance of brackish, muddy, variable water makes them one of the commonest small fish of the estuary edge.
When to see it
Quick facts
- Family
- Gobies (Gobiidae)
- Size
- Typically 4–6 cm
- UK status
- Native; abundant in estuaries and brackish shallows
Photo by Ove Glenjen, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons