---
title: Crocodilefish (Papilloculiceps longiceps)
scientific_name: Papilloculiceps longiceps
common_name: Crocodilefish
taxon: Flatheads
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2023-12-28T10:27:58.348Z
updated: 2026-08-12T14:03:41.129Z
tags: Crocodilefish, Papilloculiceps longiceps, Flatheads, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/flatheads/crocodilefish
---

# Crocodilefish (*Papilloculiceps longiceps*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Flatheads (*Platycephalidae*)
- **Size:** up to 70 cm
- **Depth:** 1-30 m
- **Diet:** Carnivore
- **Activity:** Cathemeral
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Sand, rubble and coral bases, lying still in the open
- **Reproduction:** Broadcast spawner, Gonochoric
- **Hazard:** Venomous
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- long flattened head with the eyes on top, body tapering to a normal tail
- elaborate branched lappet hanging over each pupil, like a lace curtain
- mottled sand, brown and white, matching whatever it lies on
- length up to 70 cm

Seventy centimeters (28 in) of flattened fish lying in plain sight on sand or rubble, head broad and depressed with the eyes on top, body mottled to match the bottom exactly. Divers swim over one every dive and see one every tenth.

The eyes are the thing to photograph. Each pupil is covered by a branched, lacy flap of tissue that hangs down over it like a curtain, breaking up the one part of a camouflaged animal that cannot be disguised - a dark, wet, perfectly round pupil. It cuts glare and it hides the eye, and no other fish here has anything like it.

Hunting is done by not moving. The fish settles, waits, and takes small fish and crustaceans with a fast upward gulp when they pass over the head; the wide flat skull is a suction chamber that opens in one motion.

It has venomous spines on the gill covers - not a serious hazard but a reason not to handle it - and it will let a diver approach within centimeters, which is why the species is one of the most photographed fish in this sea and why the flash of hundreds of cameras is a real cost to an animal that hunts by lying still.

## Also known as

- **English:** tentacled flathead, Indian Ocean Crocodilefish
- **Hebrew:** תמסחן ראשתן
- **French:** Poisson-crocodile tapis
- **Italian:** pesce coccodrillo indiano
- **German:** Gemeiner Krokodilsfisch
- **Spanish:** Pez cocodrilo del Océano Índico
- **Portuguese:** Peixe-crocodilo-indiano
- **Dutch:** Gewone Krokodilvis
- **Czech:** zploštělec dlouhohlavý
- **Russian:** Щупальцевый плоскоголов, рыба крокодил
- **FI:** nystykrokotiilisimppu

## Scientific synonyms

- *Papilloculiceps grandidieri* (Sauvage, 1873)
- *Platycephalus grandidieri* Sauvage, 1873
- *Platycephalus longiceps* Cuvier, 1829
- *Platycephalus papilloculus* Fowler, 1935
- *Platycephalus tentaculatus* Rüppell, 1838
- *Rogadius tentaculatus* (Rüppell, 1838)

## Range

Djibouti, Eritrea, Federal Republic of Somalia, Kenya, Madagascar, Mediterranean Sea - Eastern Basin, Mozambique, Red Sea, Seychelles, South Africa, Tanzania

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*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/flatheads/crocodilefish)*
*Updated: August 12, 2026*