WHATSTHATFISH
Bony fish

Mottled Flounder

Bothus maculiferus

Also known as: Maculated Flounder, Tropical Flounder

LCLeast ConcernIUCN Red List, 2015
Adult
@JolineCuracao · Curaçao - Caracasbaai, Curaçao · March 20201 / 1
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Overview

Found singly, during the day, over soft and hard bottoms, moving out in the open at night, foraging for food over seagrass beds.
They feed nocturnally on crustaceans and fish.

Flatfish, Soles and Flounders are placed in their families by location of their eyes. Their are both left eye and right eye dominant families.
Flatfish bury themselves in sand to hide from predators and use their eyes as periscopes as these can rotate 180 degrees.
During pelagic larval stage these fish are not flat but become so as they grow, their bodies flatten, and one eye migrates across the head next to the other eye.

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How to identify

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Habitat & where to find it

  • Range · Western Central Atlantic, Caribbean
  • Country only · 1
LIVES IN

Found singly, during the day, over soft and hard bottoms, moving out in the open at night, foraging for food over seagrass beds.

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Adult photos 1

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Discussion

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    ALL STAGES
    FOR THE MARINE-BIOLOGY CURIOUS

    Deep dive

    Taxonomy

    1. kingdomAnimalia
    2. phylumChordata
    3. classTeleostei
    4. orderPleuronectiformes
    5. familyBothidae
    6. genusBothus
    7. speciesBothus maculiferus (Poey, 1860)

    SourcesWoRMSFishBase

    06

    More in the family

    Lefteye Flounders (Bothidae)