---
title: Striated Frogfish (Antennarius striatus)
scientific_name: Antennarius striatus
common_name: Striated Frogfish
taxon: Frogfishes
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2024-10-27T11:23:51.646Z
updated: 2026-08-12T14:03:54.515Z
tags: Striated Frogfish, Antennarius striatus, Frogfishes, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/frogfishes/striated-frogfish
---

# Striated Frogfish (*Antennarius striatus*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Frogfishes (*Antennariidae*)
- **Size:** up to 25 cm
- **Depth:** 5-200 m
- **Diet:** Carnivore
- **Activity:** Cathemeral
- **Rarity:** Rare
- **Habitat:** Sand, silt and rubble, often among weed and debris
- **Reproduction:** Broadcast spawner, Gonochoric
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- shaggy body covered in skin filaments, in yellow, black, brown or orange
- dark stripes and streaks radiating over the body, often broken
- lure at the end of the rod is a worm-shaped tuft, sometimes branched
- length up to 25 cm

A shaggy lump of a fish covered in skin filaments, striped and streaked, sitting in weed and debris on soft bottom. Color runs from black through brown to bright yellow, and an individual can change it over weeks to match wherever it has settled.

The fishing rod is the best in the family. The first dorsal spine carries a lure shaped like a segmented worm, sometimes with several branches, and the fish waves it in a slow curl in front of its own mouth. Frogfish lures are species-specific imitations - worm, shrimp, small fish - and this one does worms.

The strike takes about six milliseconds and works by suction: the mouth expands to many times its volume and the prey arrives with the water. The stomach then stretches to take animals as long as the frogfish itself, including other frogfish.

It does not swim if it can walk. The pectoral fins have an elbow and are used to clamber over the bottom, and when it does swim it does so by gulping water and firing it out through the small round gill openings behind the arms - jet propulsion, in a fish that looks incapable of movement at all.

## Also known as

- **English:** striated frogfish, Blotched Anglerfish, Hairy Frogfish
- **French:** Antennaire strié
- **Italian:** Pesce rana striato, Antennario striato
- **German:** Gestreifter Anglerfisch
- **Spanish:** ranisapo estriado, pescador
- **Portuguese:** Peixe-sapo-peludo
- **Czech:** rozedranec proužkovaný
- **Japanese:** カエルアンコウ, Kaeruanko
- **Chinese:** 五腳虎, 帶紋躄魚, 条纹躄鱼
- **Russian:** Таитийская бородавчатая рыба-клоун
- **AF:** Paddavis, Streep-Hengelaar
- **MSA:** Lepu
- **TH:** ปลากบลาย

## Scientific synonyms

- *Antennarius atra* (Schultz, 1957)
- *Antennarius cunninghami* Fowler, 1941
- *Antennarius delaisi* Cadenat, 1959
- *Antennarius fuliginosus* Smith, 1957
- *Antennarius glauerti* Whitley, 1957
- *Antennarius lacepedii* Bleeker, 1856
- *Antennarius melas* Bleeker, 1857
- *Antennarius nox* Jordan, 1902
- *Antennarius occidentalis* Cadenat, 1959
- *Antennarius pinniceps* Bleeker, 1856
- *Antennarius pinniceps bleekeri* Günther, 1861
- *Antennarius pinniceps fasciata* Steindachner, 1866
- *Antennarius pinniceps pinniceps* Bleeker, 1856
- *Antennarius straitus* (Shaw, 1794)
- *Antennarius tigris* (Poey, 1852)
- *Antennarius tridens* (Temminck & Schlegel, 1845)
- *Antennarius zebrinus* (Schultz, 1957)
- *Chironectes tigris* Poey, 1852
- *Chironectes tricornis* Cloquet, 1817
- *Chironectes tridens* Temminck & Schlegel, 1845
- *Lophius striatus* Shaw, 1794
- *Lophius tricornis* (Cloquet, 1817)
- *Phrynelox atra* Schultz, 1957
- *Phrynelox cunninghami* (Fowler, 1941)
- *Phrynelox lochites* Schultz, 1964

## Range

Gulf of Mexico, Indian Ocean, Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, New Zealand, North Atlantic Ocean, South Africa, Tanzania

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