Deepwater snappers have high commercial and recreational value throughout the tropics, and their fisheries and species biology have been widely studied. However, little is known about the ecology of the juveniles between settlement to the demersal habitat and recruitment to the adult population (Munro 1987). In Hawaii, no information regarding location, size, or habitat of juvenile lutjanids has emerged after more than a decade of concentrated studies of adult stocks (Ralston 1980; Humphreys 1986). The absence of observations and collections of juvenile lutjanids or of their occurence as prey items in the adult habitat suggests that they settle elsewhere prior to recruitment.