A single record was reported recently (2017) in the eastern Mediterranean Sea near Athens, Greece, likely a result of aquarium release.

[7] During the mating phase, males become gold in color and put on displays to attract egg-laying females.

Studies have shown that pooling to create larger broods serves to not only decrease predatory effects, but also increases paternal investment.

By increasing brood size, predation rate per individual decreases as a result of dilution effects.

It has also been hypothesized that egg pooling is a simple imitation tactic by which females confirm the quality of the male.

In order to increase the propagation of their offspring, female scissortail sergeant must also actively select for good fathers.

Test eggs are energetically expensive to create, so this strategy is typically only used by large females at the beginning of the mating phase.

Filial cannibalism, the act of eating one's own offspring, is a common phenomena in territorial male fish.

When guarding their territories, investment costs are lowest for large males with easy food access.

Supplementary feeding, however, decreases the energetic costs of raising a brood and can modulate cannibalistic tendencies in male scissortail sergeants.

Experiments that supply provisional food like scissortail sergeant eggs and/or crab meat to brooding males lead to a decrease in cannibalism.

Studies show that males who skip one mating cycle due to cannibalism or other environmental factors tend to invest more effort and have larger broods during the following season.

Studies found that males who had their clutches reduced the first day of the parental phase were more likely to cannibalize the remaining eggs.

Sneaking behavior, as defined by opportunistic males that attempt to fertilize some eggs during another spawning pair, decreases the relatedness of a brood to its father.