lives in a variety of inshore habitats, generally present in waters 30 to 140 m deep on coral and rocky reefs. Juveniles tend to school in shallow sandy bays and are able to tolerate moderately turbid waters. At least one recorded capture from an estuary in Thailand has been reported. Biology The Malabar trevally often schools, especially as juveniles in shallow bays, becoming more solitary as they age. The species is not particularly aggressive, feeding on small planktonic and pelagic crustaceans such as krill, prawns, shrimp, and mysids, as well as small squids and fishes. Geographical variation in diet is common, with fish in Malaysia taking species of polychaete worms as the preferred species. Studies on gill filtering mechanisms has shown the Malabar trevally's anatomy lies between two extremes, one which is a high filtration area characteristic of planktivorous species and the other of very low area which is associated with species which take large prey items. This further suggests the Malabar trevally can filter the small krill type prey, as well as taking larger fishes and squid. Seasonal diet fluctuation in the species has been observed in northern Australia, where a seasonal abundance of squid causes the preferred prey to change from paenid shrimp to these squid. Little is known of its breeding cycle, with the only publication on the subject part of a 1984 study in Indian waters. The Malabar trevally's breeding period was reported as between February and October in this location, with the main peak from July to September. Each individual spawned only once per year. The size at which the species is first able to breed is for both sexes, with the number of eggs produced related to each individual's length and weight. In South Africa, seasonal small shoals of juveniles are known from parts of the coast, suggesting a single spawning event, also. The species is relatively short-lived like many tropical species, but has a fairly rapid population turnover. Relationship to humans The Malabar trevally is of minor importance to fisheries in most regions it inhabits, often considered too small to be worth actively targeting. In these regions, it still forms a considerable proportion of the bycatch, and studies have shown that at the current level of removal, the species is ecologically sustainable. In India and parts of Southeast Asia, however, the species is more commercially important and taken in larger quantities than elsewhere.