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.
X-ray Tetra
A translucent coastal South American characin whose see-through body and bold black-white-yellow fin markings make it instantly recognizable.
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Yucatan Molly
A large sailfin livebearer native to the coastal waters of the Yucatan Peninsula, known for the male's dramatically tall, sail-like dorsal fin used in courtship.
brackishWhite Weakfish
A slender, pale silvery-white weakfish common in estuaries and coastal lagoons along the South American Atlantic coast.
brackishViolet Goby
An eel-like burrowing goby with an iridescent violet-grey sheen and a large upturned mouth, found in muddy estuaries of the tropical Americas.
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Targetfish
A silvery, deep-bodied fish marked with three or four bold, curving dark stripes running from head to tail, common in brackish estuaries across the Indo-Pacific.
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Wrestling Halfbeak
Named for the ritualized jaw-locking contests between rival males, the wrestling halfbeak is a slender surface-dwelling fish from Southeast Asian creeks and mangrove-fringed brackish waters.
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Swamp Eel
A limbless, scaleless, snake-like eel that burrows through mud in freshwater and brackish swamps of South and Southeast Asia and can survive in poorly oxygenated water using accessory air breathing.
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Weakfish
The Weakfish is an iridescent greenish-bronze sciaenid with diagonal spotted markings, found in mid-Atlantic estuaries and coastal waters of the U.S.
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White Perch
A silvery, deep-bodied temperate bass rather than a true perch, common in brackish estuaries and coastal rivers of eastern North America.
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Tomcod
The Atlantic tomcod is a small, estuarine member of the cod family found along the northwestern Atlantic coast, notable for tolerating brackish and nearly fresh water unlike most of its relatives.
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Twaite Shad
A slender anadromous herring relative found along European and North African coasts, the Twaite Shad migrates into estuaries and rivers to spawn and is distinguished from the Allis Shad by its row of dark flank spots.
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Spotted Scat
A deep-bodied, disc-shaped fish covered in dark spots over an olive-to-silver background, common in Indo-Pacific estuaries and harbors. Its bold pattern and spiny dorsal fin make it easy to pick out among schooling brackish fish.
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Silver Perch
The Silver Perch is a small, bright silvery sciaenid common in seagrass and oyster reef habitats along the U.S. Atlantic and Gulf coasts.
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Timor Halfbeak
A small, slender halfbeak of the genus Zenarchopterus with a needle-thin lower jaw, common in the brackish estuaries and coastal rivers of the Indo-Pacific near Timor and Southeast Asia.
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Starry Flounder
The starry flounder is a distinctive North Pacific flatfish recognized by alternating orange and black bands across its fins and rough, star-shaped scales, and notable for tolerating a wide range of salinities.
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Staghorn Sculpin
A common bottom-dwelling sculpin of Pacific coast bays and estuaries, named for the large branching (antler-like) spine on its gill cover.
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Tarpon
A giant, silver-scaled fish known as the 'Silver King,' famous for its acrobatic leaps and its ability to gulp air at the surface in low-oxygen coastal waters.
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Snook
A sleek, silvery predator with a bold black lateral stripe and a distinctive sloped, pointed snout, closely tied to mangrove shorelines and warm coastal estuaries.
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Shortnose Sturgeon
The shortnose sturgeon is a small, endangered anadromous fish of eastern North America, distinguished from its larger Atlantic sturgeon relative by a shorter, blunter snout.
brackishSpaghetti Eel
An extremely thin, worm-like burrowing eel that spends most of its life buried in sandy or muddy estuarine bottoms across the Indo-Pacific, rarely seen in the open.
brackishSleeper Goby
A stout, goby-like estuarine fish that rests motionless on the bottom for long stretches, distinguished from true gobies by its separate (unfused) pelvic fins.
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Slender Giant Moray
The longest of all moray eel species, this extremely elongated, olive-grey eel patrols muddy estuaries and mangrove channels across the Indo-Pacific rather than typical coral reef.
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Sheepshead Minnow
A stocky, deep-bodied pupfish tolerant of extreme salinity swings, common in salt marshes and tidal creeks along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts of North America.
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Stonefish
The estuarine stonefish is a heavily camouflaged, warty bottom-dweller of Indo-Pacific mudflats and estuaries, considered one of the most venomous fish known.
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Streaked Spinefoot
A large silvery-gray rabbitfish marked with fine dark streaks and scattered pale spots, commonly found in estuaries, mangroves, and coastal reefs across the Indo-Pacific.
brackishShort-headed Lamprey
The short-headed lamprey is an anadromous, jawless fish of southeastern Australia and Tasmania, recognized by its notably short head and a marine parasitic phase before spawning in rivers.
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Striped Bass
A large, silvery, hard-fighting bass marked with bold black stripes, native to the Atlantic coast and now widely established in freshwater reservoirs across North America.
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Sturgeon
An ancient family of large, armored bony fish with bony scutes instead of scales and a shark-like barbeled snout. Sturgeon migrate between rivers and the sea to spawn and are among the most endangered fish groups.
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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.
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Spotted Seatrout
A slender estuarine predator of the southeastern United States, recognized by the bold black spots scattered across its silvery back and dorsal fin.
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Spotted Croaker
A large Indo-Pacific drum with scattered dark spots along its silvery back, common in turbid estuaries and river mouths.
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Spot Croaker
Spot is a small, deep-bodied estuarine fish easily identified by a single dark shoulder spot and faint oblique bars along its upper body.
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Sand Seatrout
A pale, slender weakfish common in Gulf of Mexico bays and estuaries, closely related to spotted seatrout but lacking body spots.
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Redfish
A coppery-bronze estuarine predator famous for the large black eyespot near its tail, the Redfish is a mainstay of shallow coastal flats along the Gulf and southeastern Atlantic coasts.
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Silver Scat
A disc-shaped, silvery fish marked with dark vertical bars, found schooling in brackish estuaries and mangroves across the Indo-Pacific and northern Australia.
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Silver Mono
The plain, uniformly silver adult form of the mono, a coin-shaped estuarine fish that loses its faint juvenile eye-bar as it matures. Common in schools around Indo-Pacific mangroves, jetties, and harbors.
brackishSevruga
The sevruga, or starry sturgeon, is a slender anadromous sturgeon of the Caspian, Black, and Azov Sea basins, known for its long upturned snout and rows of star-shaped bony scutes.
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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.
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Reticulated Pufferfish
A puffer of Indo-Pacific mangroves and estuaries, patterned with fine dark reticulated lines over a pale body and often marked with a network of interconnected markings resembling a map.
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Sand Goby
A small, sand-colored goby common on shallow sandy seabeds and estuaries around northern Europe, distinguished by a dark spot at the base of its first dorsal fin.
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Sailfin Molly
Named for the male's spectacular, sail-like dorsal fin, this coastal livebearer from the southeastern United States and Mexico is a striking sight in brackish marshes and aquariums alike.
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River Lamprey
The river lamprey, also known as the lampern, is a small anadromous European lamprey that feeds parasitically on fish in coastal and estuarine waters before migrating into rivers to spawn.
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Pigfish
A grunt of Atlantic and Gulf coast estuaries, marked by diagonal rows of small blue and gold spots and named for its pig-like grunting sound.
brackishPouched Lamprey
The pouched lamprey is a jawless, eel-shaped fish named for the fleshy throat pouch that develops in breeding males, migrating from the open ocean into Southern Hemisphere rivers to spawn.
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Mono
A shimmering, disc-shaped fish with a strongly flattened body and tall, angular fins, native to Indo-Pacific estuaries. Adults school in brackish coastal waters and shift gradually toward full seawater as they mature.
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Mangrove Jack
A deep red Indo-Pacific snapper whose juveniles grow up in mangrove estuaries and rivers, tolerating salinities from freshwater to full seawater.
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Pacific Blue-eye
A tiny, schooling fish common in coastal streams and estuaries of eastern Australia, easily recognized by its reflective, luminous blue eyes.
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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.
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