Data from: Cleaning interactions by gobies on a Tropical Eastern Pacific coral reef

The present study describes the cleaning interactions among species of cleaner gobies Tigrigobius spp. and Elacatinus puncticulatus (family Gobiidae) and the client fish species they clean in a coral reef of Gorgona Island, Colombia. In 419 cleaning events, we observed 27 species acting as clients of Tigrigobius spp., whereas only nine were clients of E. puncticulatus. Paranthias colonus and Cephalopholis panamensis were the species most commonly cleaned by Tigrigobius spp., while Ophioblennius steindachneri and Stegastes acalpulcoensis were the clients most commonly cleaned by E. puncticulatus. The abundance (but not the body size) of clients was an important variable predicting the cleaning frequency observed for clients of Tigrigobius spp., but this was not the case for clients of E. puncticulatus. Additionally, Tigrigobius spp. preferred cleaning planktivores, sessile invertebrate feeders and territorial herbivores (Ivlev's index >0·15), whereas E. puncticulatus did not exhibit any preference. We observed two major peaks of cleaning activity for Tigrigobius spp., one in the early morning and another one in the late afternoon. These results suggest that Tigrigobius spp. is a specialized cleaner goby, whereas E. puncticulatus is a facultative cleaner that cleans sporadically.Cleaning_AnalysisThe data sets available here are parts of the following article: Quimbayo JP and Zapata FA Cleaning interactions by gobies on a tropical eastern Pacific coral reef Description: Matrix showed temporal variation of the cleaning activity of gobies cleaners at Gorgona Island, Tropical Eastern Pacific. Each column in this matrix had information on the species richness and abundance of clients observed during this study. Moreover, this matrix has information on the cleaning frequency, and the number of cleaning events observed to each trophic group. A cleaning event is defined as the observation of a cleaner removing ectoparasites, diseased tissue, and/or mucus from the body surface, gills or buccal cavity of the clients. Data are provided in the form of comma separated values files (csv). All R codes for reproducing analyses are available from the authors on request. Any additional queries should be directed to the corresponding author Juan P. Quimbayo (quimbayo.j.p@gmail.com) The release of this data does not exempt those who reuse the data from following community norms for scholarly communication, in particular from the citation of this paper and the original data authors as detailed above.Clients_&_CleanersThe data sets available here are parts of the following article: Quimbayo JP and Zapata FA Cleaning interactions by gobies on a tropical eastern Pacific coral reef Description: Matrix showed the list of clients attended by gobies cleaners at Gorgona Island, Tropical Eastern Pacific. A cleaning event is defined as the observation of a cleaner removing ectoparasites, diseased tissue, and/or mucus from the body surface, gills or buccal cavity of the clients. Data are provided in the form of comma separated values files (csv). All R codes for reproducing analyses are available from the authors on request. Any additional queries should be directed to the corresponding author Juan P. Quimbayo (quimbayo.j.p@gmail.com) The release of this data does not exempt those who reuse the data from following community norms for scholarly communication, in particular from the citation of this paper and the original data authors as detailed above