Walks on free pectoral rays and buries in sand with the eyes and mouth left clear.
A stinger to about 25 cm, grey to brown, the head lumpy and the body carrying loose skin flaps that collect sediment. The lower two rays of each pectoral fin are free of the fin membrane and are used as legs: the fish walks over the bottom on them rather than swimming, one side and then the other. Buried, it works itself down until only the eyes, the mouth line and the top of the back are clear, and at that point it is one of the harder animals on a sand slope to see.
Disturbed, it lifts and spreads the pectoral fins, and the inner surfaces are boldly marked in black, white and yellow against the drab outside. The display is brief and is the reason most photographs of the genus are taken during a move rather than at rest. Separating this species from the spiny devilfish depends on that pectoral pattern and on head proportions, and a resting fish with the fins folded is often best logged at Inimicus.
It hunts small fish and crustaceans from ambush, taking them upward as they pass. Recorded on sand, silt and rubble from a few metres to about 80 m in the western Pacific. Because it buries and does not move away, it is one of the animals that argues for keeping hands and knees off soft bottoms.
Ratings are per location: 1 means found on most dives that look for it, 5 means a handful of records. Where enough dives have been logged the figure is calculated from them; otherwise it is an editorial estimate, and says so. We publish habitat and destination, not the dive site.
