Frogfish

How it lives

Frogfishes are small and stocky, with scaleless skin that is often covered in bumpy spinules. Many species change colour, though a change can take days to weeks. They rarely swim, and prefer to clamber over the bottom on their fins. Most species spawn into open water, and the eggs form a floating gelatinous mass that can hold up to 180,000 eggs. A few species lay on a solid surface, and some males carry or guard the eggs. GBIF holds 112 records of frogfishes from Papua New Guinea, covering more than a dozen names, among them Antennatus coccineus, Antennarius hispidus, Histrio histrio, Antennarius pictus and Antennarius commerson. The sources checked do not break records down by province, so Milne Bay is not confirmed here.

Where it goes

Frogfishes mostly stay put. They wait on the sea floor for prey and cover only short stretches by walking on their fins. After hatching, the young drift as plankton for one to two months before settling on the bottom as tiny frogfish. The sargassumfish has fins adapted to grab strands of sargassum weed and climb through it.

We only draw a journey on the map when scientists have tracked it or clearly documented it. For this animal we have not found one yet.

Populations

There is no family-wide figure, and status differs by species. Of 12 frogfish species checked through GBIF's IUCN link, 9 are Least Concern (Antennatus coccineus, Antennarius hispidus, Antennatus nummifer, Antennatus tuberosus, Antennarius pictus, Antennarius commerson, Antennarius striatus, Antennarius maculatus, Antennarius randalli), Antennarius biocellatus is Data Deficient, Histiophryne cryptacanthus is Not Evaluated, and no category was found for the sargassumfish (Histrio histrio). FishBase lists the painted and Commerson's frogfish as Least Concern, assessed in 2021, and says they are of no interest to fisheries. The family is found in almost all tropical and subtropical seas.