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.
South American Lungfish
An eel-shaped South American fish that breathes almost entirely through a single lung, allowing it to survive dry seasons buried in mud.
freshwater
Pallid Sturgeon
The pallid sturgeon is a large, pale, endangered fish of the Missouri and Mississippi rivers, adapted to fast, turbid water with a flattened snout and reduced eyes.
freshwater
Pelagic Stingray
A uniquely oceanic stingray that never touches the seabed, drifting through warm and temperate seas worldwide while feeding on squid and small fish.
pelagic
Goldfish
A hardy freshwater fish domesticated from the wild Prussian carp, prized worldwide as an ornamental pond and aquarium species in many color forms.
freshwater
Caspian Lamprey
The Caspian lamprey is a parasitic, jawless fish that lives in the brackish Caspian Sea and migrates into tributary rivers of Russia, Iran, and neighboring countries to spawn.
brackish
Black Skirt Tetra
A silvery-gray tetra with a flowing black skirt-like tail and fins, whose dark coloration typically fades somewhat as the fish matures.
freshwater
Atlantic Sturgeon
The Atlantic sturgeon is a large, armored anadromous fish of eastern North America, spending years at sea before returning to coastal rivers to spawn.
brackish
Tiger Barb
A small, deep-bodied freshwater fish marked with four bold black vertical bars across a golden-orange body, often seen darting energetically in tight schools.
freshwater
Red Grouper
The red grouper is a heavy-bodied, reddish-brown reef fish common on rocky and coral bottoms of the Gulf of Mexico and western Atlantic, known for excavating shallow depressions in sediment.
reef
Deep-sea Smelt
A small, silvery-bodied deep-sea fish that drifts through the dark midwater zone feeding on tiny plankton, forming a key link in deep ocean food webs.
deepsea
Cardinal Tetra
A tiny, jewel-toned freshwater fish with an iridescent blue stripe running the length of its body above a vivid red stripe below, native to the blackwater tributaries of the Amazon.
freshwater
Bluestriped Grunt
A vividly striped Caribbean reef fish with a bright yellow body crossed by narrow electric-blue lines, often seen in dense daytime schools beneath reef ledges.
reef
Russian Sturgeon
The Russian sturgeon is a large, critically endangered anadromous fish of the Caspian, Black, and Azov Sea basins, known for its short blunt snout and robust armored body.
brackish
Scaled Sardine
A small, deep-bodied silvery fish that forms dense inshore schools along the Western Atlantic coast, easily confused with other small herring-like species.
saltwater
Piranha
A deep-bodied South American river fish famed for its sharp interlocking teeth and coordinated group feeding behavior, though most species are opportunistic scavengers.
freshwater
Gulf Menhaden
A deep-bodied, oily-scaled herring relative that forms enormous schools in Gulf of Mexico estuaries, playing a major role as a forage fish in coastal food webs.
brackish
European Anchovy
A slender, small-bodied schooling fish with a distinctive pointed snout and underslung mouth, found in enormous shoals along European and North African coasts and throughout the Mediterranean.
pelagic
Delhezi Bichir
A boldly barred Congo Basin fish with a series of dark vertical bands along its yellow-tan body and a row of spiny finlets along its back.
freshwater
Antarctic Cod
Antarctic cod is a bottom-dwelling notothenioid fish of the Southern Ocean, adapted to near-freezing water and recognized by its mottled brown, camouflaged body and broad head.
saltwater
Silver Bream
A silvery European freshwater fish with notably large, protruding eyes, often confused with young Common Bream but distinguished by its larger scales.
freshwater
Shanny
The most common rockpool blenny of the northeastern Atlantic, the Shanny is a stout, big-eyed fish that tolerates the harsh, fluctuating conditions of the intertidal zone.
saltwater
Sawfish
A critically endangered ray with a long, tooth-lined snout resembling a saw, used to detect and strike schooling fish in shallow tropical waters.
cartilaginous
Red Drum
The Red Drum is a coppery-bronze coastal fish of the western Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico, best known for the dark eyespot near its tail.
brackish
Japanese Eel
The Japanese Eel is an East Asian catadromous fish that migrates from freshwater rivers to offshore Pacific spawning grounds, and is now classified as Endangered.
freshwater