Fish Encyclopedia
Search and identify 1,000+ fish species — freshwater, saltwater, reef, and pelagic — with habitat, size, diet, behavior, and how to tell them apart.
Coral Grouper
The coral grouper is a vivid orange-red reef fish covered in small electric-blue spots, commonly seen darting among coral heads across the Indo-Pacific.
reef
Coral Hind
A vivid orange-red Indo-Pacific grouper scattered with pale iridescent-blue spots, commonly seen resting near coral heads and reef ledges.
reef
Smallmouth Bass
A bronze-green freshwater bass native to eastern North America, prized as a popular sport fish and recognized by its vertical dark bars and reddish eyes. It favors clear, rocky rivers, streams, and lakes.
freshwater
Scopas Tang
A deep-bodied, disc-shaped surgeonfish usually seen in muted brown to gray tones, valued on reefs and in aquariums alike as an efficient, hardy algae grazer.
reef
Sandbar Shark
A robust, migratory requiem shark named for its very tall, triangular first dorsal fin, common in coastal nursery bays worldwide.
cartilaginous
Garden Eel
Garden Eels are slender, colony-forming eels that live permanently anchored in sandy burrows near reefs, swaying in the current as they catch drifting plankton.
reef
Bullhead Catfish
A hardy, whiskered bottom-dweller with a rounded tail and mottled brown skin, thriving in muddy, low-oxygen ponds and slow streams across North America.
freshwater
Longtooth Grouper
A large brownish grouper found from southern Japan to the South China Sea, mottled with faint darker blotches and named for its prominent elongated canine teeth.
reef
Bocaccio
A large, streamlined rockfish with a prominent lower jaw and reddish-brown to olive coloring, once heavily depleted along the Pacific coast and now the focus of long-term rebuilding efforts.
saltwater
Sebae Clownfish
A dark brown clownfish with a bold yellow tail and two white body bars, native to reefs of the northern Indian Ocean and closely tied to the sebae sea anemone.
reef
Quillback Rockfish
A mottled brown and orange rockfish with a tall, dark-blotched spiny dorsal fin that gives it a distinctive quill-like silhouette, commonly found around rocky reefs and kelp.
saltwater
Unicornfish
A large gray-brown surgeonfish named for the forward-pointing bony horn projecting from its forehead, an important herbivore grazing tough brown algae on Indo-Pacific reef flats.
reef
Semicircle Angelfish
A large Indo-Pacific angelfish; adults are greenish-brown with blue-speckled fins and blue face lines.
reef
Klein's Butterflyfish
A golden-brown Indo-Pacific butterflyfish with a dark eye bar and dusky patches, common on many reefs.
reef
Ballan Wrasse
The largest wrasse in northern European waters, a stout rocky-reef fish with highly variable green, brown, or reddish mottling.
saltwater
Northern Wolffish
The largest wolffish species, the Northern Wolffish is a plain grey-brown, deep-water predator of the North Atlantic and Arctic with powerful crushing jaws.
deepsea
Chevron Tang
A dark surgeonfish covered in fine orange chevron-shaped striping that fades to plain brown with age, prized for its dramatic juvenile pattern.
reef
Camouflage Grouper
A stocky, well-camouflaged Indo-Pacific grouper with a mottled brown-and-tan pattern of hexagonal blotches that helps it blend seamlessly into reef substrate.
reef
American Plaice
A right-eyed flounder of the cold North Atlantic, identifiable by its rough scales, curved lateral line, and reddish-brown upper body.
saltwater
Yellowfin Grouper
The yellowfin grouper is a reddish-brown to olive reef grouper of the Caribbean and western Atlantic, easily recognized by the bright yellow patch on its pectoral fins.
reef
Spotfin Lionfish
A true lionfish with elongated, spotted pectoral fin rays and reddish-brown bars, found resting in reef crevices by day across the Indo-Pacific.
reef
Snowy Grouper
A dark gray-brown deepwater grouper of the western Atlantic; juveniles are boldly marked with white spots that fade to a plainer, darker pattern in large adults.
deepsea
Java Rabbitfish
A greenish-brown rabbitfish patterned with fine wavy vermiculated markings, commonly found in mangrove-lined estuaries and brackish coastal waters of the Indo-Pacific.
brackish
Guineafowl Pufferfish
The Guineafowl Pufferfish is a variably colored reef puffer, most often dark brown to black with small white spots, resembling the plumage of a guineafowl bird.
reef