---
title: Bluestriped Fangblenny (Plagiotremus rhinorhynchos)
scientific_name: Plagiotremus rhinorhynchos
common_name: Bluestriped Fangblenny
taxon: Combtooth blenny
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2024-11-17T21:07:36.956Z
updated: 2026-08-14T11:36:01.697Z
tags: Bluestriped Fangblenny, Plagiotremus rhinorhynchos, Combtooth blenny, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/combtooth-blenny/bluestriped-fangblenny
---

# Bluestriped Fangblenny (*Plagiotremus rhinorhynchos*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Combtooth blenny (*Blenniidae*)
- **Size:** up to 12 cm
- **Depth:** 1-40 m
- **Diet:** Carnivore
- **Activity:** Diurnal
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Coral reef, hovering in open water near cleaning stations
- **Reproduction:** Egg layer, Gonochoric
- **Hazard:** Venomous
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- slender body with two blue-black stripes, colors switchable between blue, orange and black
- hovers in open water rather than perching, unlike most blennies
- swims with a wriggling, back-and-forth motion copied from the cleaner wrasse
- length up to 12 cm

The reef's most accomplished fraud. This blenny copies the cleaner wrasse - the blue and black stripes, the hovering, even the little dancing motion cleaners use to advertise themselves - and it works well enough that fish queue up for it.

Then it bites. Instead of picking off parasites it takes a mouthful of mucus, skin or fin from the customer and bolts. Fish that have been robbed learn to avoid the pattern, so the blenny switches: individuals change color to match whatever cleaner or damselfish is common locally, and a population under pressure shifts its whole appearance.

The teeth are the equipment. Two enormous curved fangs sit in the lower jaw, grooved and connected to a venom gland - and the venom is not for killing. It contains opioid-like peptides that drop the victim's blood pressure and disorient it, so the bitten fish loses interest in chasing rather than being harmed. A predator that swallows the blenny gets the same dose and spits it out.

Twelve centimeters (5 in) of fish that lives entirely on other fish's tolerance, and one of the very few venoms on this reef used for escape rather than for attack.

## Also known as

- **English:** bluestriped blenny, Cleaner Mimic, bluestriped fangblenny
- **French:** Blennie à bandes bleues
- **Japanese:** ミナミギンポ, Minamigimpo

## Scientific synonyms

- *Aspidontus rhinorhynchops* (Bleeker, 1852)
- *Aspidontus rhinorhynchos* (Bleeker, 1852)
- *Petroscirtes amblyrhynchos* Bleeker, 1857
- *Petroscirtes amblyrhynchus* Bleeker, 1857
- *Petroscirtes rhinorhynchos* Bleeker, 1852
- *Petroscirtes rhinorhynchus* Bleeker, 1852
- *Petroscirtes rhynorhynchus* Bleeker, 1852
- *Petroskirtes amblyrhynchos* Bleeker, 1857
- *Petroskirtes rhinorhijnchos* Bleeker, 1852
- *Petroskirtes rhinorhynchos* Bleeker, 1852
- *Plagiotremus rhinorhynchus* (Bleeker, 1852)
- *Plagiotremus rhinorhyncos* (Bleeker, 1852)
- *Plagiotremus rhynorhynchus* (Bleeker, 1852)
- *Plagiotremus rhynorhyncus* (Bleeker, 1852)
- *Runula amblyrhynchus* (Bleeker, 1857)
- *Runula rhinorhynchos* (Bleeker, 1852)

## Range

Indian Ocean, Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, Red Sea, Seychelles, South Africa

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*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/combtooth-blenny/bluestriped-fangblenny)*
*Updated: August 14, 2026*