Boleophthalmus caeruleomaculatus
Blue-spotted Mudskipper
Much of what follows is drawn from a pair of field-trip photo-essays documenting a series of collecting trips between Cairns and Weipa on Cape York, which turned up an extraordinarily rich cross-section of Australia and New Guinea’s smaller estuarine and mangrove-associated gobies.
Boleophthalmus caeruleomaculatus was watched displaying at the mouth of the Wenlock River near Weipa, where “males of both species displayed their various territorial antics; puffed up with their erect dorsal fins, mouths wide open, seeing who could dominate the mudflat” — the same trip and location also yielded the first Australian record of the related White-spotted Mudskipper (Boleophthalmus poti), previously known only from the Fly River delta of Papua New Guinea, identified in consultation with Northern Territory Museum goby specialist Dr Helen Larson.
Compiled for Home of the Rainbowfish from ANGFA sources: J. Lenagan, “Cairns to Weipa and back… the Gobioides. Part 1”, Fishes of Sahul 33, 2019, pp. 1448–1483.