Flattened, mottled to match rubble, with a lacy fringed flap over the pupil that breaks up the one part camouflage cannot hide.
To about 70 cm, flattened top to bottom, mottled to match coarse sand and rubble, with a broad flat head and a lacy fringed flap over the pupil that breaks up the one part of the animal camouflage cannot hide. The Indo-Pacific crocodilefish of Lembeh is a different species in a different genus; this is the Red Sea animal and the two are not interchangeable.
It lies still on sand or rubble beside reef and waits, taking small fish with a strike from a standing start. It does not move when approached, which makes it one of the easier subjects on a Red Sea dive and one of the easier animals to kneel on. The eye is the picture: get low, light it from the side, and the iris lappet shows.
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.
