A fringe of skin tassels along the jaw that breaks the outline completely.
A scorpionfish to about 25 cm, carrying more skin appendages than any of its relatives here — a dense fringe of tassels along the lower jaw and around the eyes, and further flaps scattered over the body. Colour runs from red and pink through brown to a pale mottled cream, and an animal sitting on sponge will usually be close to the colour of that sponge. The tassels do the work of the camouflage: they remove the straight line of the jaw, which is the edge a predator or a diver would otherwise read as a fish.
Sits on rubble, sponge and rock rather than on open sediment, in the same places as the devil scorpionfish, and is separated from it by the absence of the pronounced hump on the back and by the far heavier fringing. Ambushes small fish and crustaceans, mostly at night, and does not move for divers. Recorded from about 3 to 40 m. Venomous dorsal spines, and the usual consequence of not seeing one is a hand placed on it.
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.
