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.
Hake
A slender, silvery predatory fish with a large toothy mouth and two widely separated dorsal fins, Hake patrol continental shelf waters of the northeastern Atlantic and Mediterranean.
saltwater
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
Goliath Grouper
One of the largest bony fish on Atlantic reefs, the goliath grouper is a massive, mottled brown ambush predator that shelters around wrecks, caves, and mangrove-lined shorelines.
reef
Hardyhead Silverside
A robust, silvery schooling fish common in shallow lagoons and reef flats across the Indo-Pacific, identified by its broad head and prominent silver midline stripe.
saltwater
Estuarine Stonefish
A heavily camouflaged, encrusted-looking fish that lies motionless on muddy estuary and mangrove bottoms across the Indo-Pacific, bearing venomous dorsal spines as a natural defense.
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
Chub
A robust, thick-shouldered cyprinid of European rivers, the chub is a wary predator-scavenger that lurks under banks and cover, feeding on anything from insects to small fish.
freshwater
Butterfish
A disc-shaped, silvery schooling fish of the northwestern Atlantic shelf, the Butterfish migrates seasonally between inshore and offshore waters and often shelters near jellyfish as a juvenile.
pelagic
Catfish
A vast, worldwide group of scaleless, whisker-faced bottom-dwelling fish; the channel catfish, one of the most familiar North American species, is shown here as representative.
freshwater
Bowfin
A hardy, ancient freshwater fish with a long undulating dorsal fin and the ability to gulp air, often called a living fossil for its unchanged lineage of millions of years.
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
Wolf Eel
The Wolf Eel is a large, spotted, eel-shaped fish of North Pacific rocky reefs that forms long-term pairs and cooperatively guards its eggs in a shared den.
saltwater
Watchman Goby
The Watchman Goby is a bright yellow burrow-dwelling fish that forms a cooperative partnership with a pistol shrimp, hovering guard duty at the burrow entrance while the shrimp maintains the tunnel.
reef
Suckermouth Catfish
A heavily armored South American catfish with a disc-shaped sucking mouth used to graze algae from rocks and wood, one of the most familiar aquarium fish worldwide.
freshwater
Spotted Scorpionfish
A heavily camouflaged reef fish with mottled brown, red, and white patterning and venomous dorsal spines, blending seamlessly into coral rubble and rocky bottom across the western Atlantic.
reef
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.
reefPouched 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.
brackish
Pacific Jack Mackerel
A silvery, schooling open-water fish of the eastern Pacific, marked by a full ridge of bony scutes along its sides and an ecologically vital role as forage for larger predators.
pelagic
Lake Sturgeon
The lake sturgeon is a large, armored, long-lived freshwater fish native to the Great Lakes and Mississippi basin, recognizable by its bony scute rows and shovel-shaped snout.
freshwater
Halfbeak
The common name for slender, surface-swimming fish of the family Hemiramphidae, marked by a short upper jaw and a long, needle-like lower jaw; the Common Halfbeak represents the group.
saltwater
Goldsinny Wrasse
A small reddish-brown wrasse marked by a black tail-base spot, the Goldsinny Wrasse patrols rocky Atlantic reefs and is known for picking parasites off other fish.
saltwater
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
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