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Some cold-hearted experimenters tested this theory by scraping the mucous off a clown-fish and placing it back with its anemone. The hapless fish was immediately and unceremoniously stung.

Juvenile Clark's anemone-fish, in the distinctive bulb-tentacled anemone. 15 meters, Bunaken Island, Sulawesi.

Clownfishes are protandrous hermaphrodites; that is, all mature as males, and then a few sex-reverse to females. A typical anemone will contain a pair of clownfish, and perhaps a few young ones.

The largest fish in the group is the female. If she should die, the reigning male sex-reverses, and the dominant juvenile becomes the functional male. Juveniles sharing an anemone with an adult pair are hormonally stunted, and remain small.

Although clownfish are the only fishes to require an anemone host, other small damsels will opportunistically occupy anemones as juveniles, especially various species of Dascyllus.

Young Clark's anemonefish, Amphiprion clarkii, in the distinctive sand anemone, Heteractis aurora.