🐟 Fish · Diplodus vulgaris
Two-banded seabream
Xirgienin Maltese, also Sargu
Two black collars and a lot of curiosity
Meet the Two-banded seabream
A compact, oval silver seabream with two obvious black bands: a broad dark collar just behind the head covering the nape and gill cover, and a second dark band wrapped around the tail stalk. Between them the flanks are silvery grey washed with gold and crossed by many fine golden horizontal lines. The mouth is small with chisel-like front teeth for cropping, the tail is forked and the fins are dusky grey.
This is one of the friendliest fish on a Maltese dive. Two-banded seabream work the reef in small groups, turning over stones and nipping at algae, worms and small shellfish, and they will often follow divers, especially where anyone has ever fed fish. They are found all round Malta, Gozo and Comino on rocky reef, boulder slopes and the edges of seagrass, and are common right from the entry steps down to 40 m or so.
Maltese has two names in play. Xirgien is the recognised trade name for Diplodus vulgaris in Malta, while sargu is used for the white seabream Diplodus sargus and, loosely, for the whole group. The two-banded seabream has a local minimum landing size of 18 cm.
When to look: All year and at every depth, usually the first fish to appear once you settle on the bottom.
Diving with them
- Settle on the bottom and wait rather than chasing; they come to a stationary diver within a minute or two
- Watch them turn small stones over with their mouths, which is worth filming and also flushes out shrimp and blennies
- Do not feed them, as fed groups become a nuisance around entry points and lose their wariness of spearfishers
- The two black bands are the ID, so shoot side-on rather than three-quarter to keep both in frame
- They often trail an octopus or a foraging diver hoping for scraps stirred up from the bottom
Can it hurt you?Harmless
Completely harmless. It has a small mouth built for cropping algae and shells and no spines or venom of any concern.
Easily confused with
- White seabream (Diplodus sargus) has several vertical dark bars down the flank and only one black band at the tail
- Sharpsnout seabream (Diplodus puntazzo) has a pointed snout and many narrow bars
- Annular seabream (Diplodus annularis) is smaller, yellower in the fins and has a single black ring on the tail stalk with no dark collar
Where to meet them: 106 sites
Armier Bay
Malta
Benghisa Point
Malta
Benghisa Reef
Malta
Further reading: FishBase – Diplodus vulgaris, Maltese name Xirgien · EU fish commercial names – Maltese designation for Diplodus vulgaris · Maltese minimum fish size restrictions (Xirgien 18 cm) · Wikipedia – Diplodus vulgaris