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.
Ornate Butterflyfish
A showy Indo-Pacific butterflyfish with diagonal orange stripes across a white body and black-and-yellow face bands.
reef
Dwarf Lionfish
A compact, mottled lionfish with broad fan-like fins and venomous spines, ambushing prey on Indo-Pacific reefs.
reef
Bird Wrasse
An Indo-Pacific wrasse instantly recognized by its long, bird-like snout used to probe coral for prey.
reef
Picasso Triggerfish
A boldly patterned triggerfish with geometric blue, yellow, and black markings, common on shallow Indo-Pacific reef flats.
reef
Fiji Blue Devil
A striking blue-headed, yellow-bodied damselfish endemic to the coral reefs of Fiji and nearby South Pacific islands.
reef
Bull Trout
A large, cold-water char native to the Pacific Northwest and Rocky Mountains, requiring exceptionally cold, clean streams and listed as threatened across much of its range in the United States.
freshwater
Rex Sole
A slender, deep-dwelling northeastern Pacific flatfish notable for unusually long pectoral fins and plain light brown coloration on cold continental shelf and slope bottoms.
deepsea
Yellowtail Wrasse
A striking Indo-Pacific wrasse whose bright red spotted juveniles transform into green-blue adults with a yellow tail.
reef
Chinook Salmon
The largest of the Pacific salmon species, prized for its size, known for long river migrations that can exceed a thousand miles.
freshwater
Auriga Butterflyfish
A very common Indo-Pacific butterflyfish with cross-hatched white body, yellow rear, and often a trailing dorsal filament.
reefSpeckled Flounder
A small, left-eyed flatfish of the tropical eastern Pacific, named for the fine speckled pattern covering its upper body.
saltwater
Silverstripe Halfbeak
A slender halfbeak marked by a bright silver lateral stripe, found skimming the surface of tropical Indo-Pacific reef lagoons.
reef
Moon Wrasse
A fast-swimming green Indo-Pacific wrasse with pink-magenta facial streaks and a bright yellow crescent-moon tail.
reef
Golden Trevally
A bright golden-yellow jack, often banded as a juvenile, found around coral reefs and lagoons throughout the Indo-Pacific.
reef
Dolly Varden
A char of Pacific coastal rivers named for a colorfully dressed Dickens character, closely related to and often confused with Arctic Char.
freshwater
Longnose Hawkfish
A red-and-white lattice-patterned hawkfish with an unmistakable elongated snout, perched motionlessly on gorgonian sea fans across the Indo-Pacific.
reef
Yellowfin Croaker
A silvery drum common in Pacific surf zones, recognized by faint diagonal lines along its flanks and yellow-tinted fins.
saltwater
White Seabass
The White Seabass is a large Pacific coast drum with a bluish-bronze back and silvery sides, closely associated with California's kelp forests.
saltwaterWhite Croaker
The White Croaker is a pale, silvery-brassy sciaenid common in shallow Pacific coastal waters from British Columbia to Baja California.
saltwater
Bluebanded Sea Bream
An Indo-Pacific reef fish, actually a snapper, marked by diagonal electric-blue bands on yellow and trailing fin filaments in adults.
reef
Blackbarred Halfbeak
A silvery halfbeak marked with faint dark vertical bars, common over seagrass beds and reef flats across the Indo-Pacific.
reef
Yellowbelly Damselfish
A small blue-grey damselfish with a bright yellow underside, found sheltering around coral and rubble on shallow reefs of the western Pacific.
reef
Spotted Croaker
A large Indo-Pacific drum with scattered dark spots along its silvery back, common in turbid estuaries and river mouths.
brackish
Naso Tang
A large surgeonfish with bright orange lips and a yellow tail-base marking, grazing algae along Indo-Pacific reef slopes.
reef