---
title: Redmouth Grouper (Aethaloperca rogaa)
scientific_name: Aethaloperca rogaa
common_name: Redmouth Grouper
taxon: Groupers
published: 2024-11-06T22:24:27.485Z
updated: 2026-08-13T12:14:23.073Z
tags: Redmouth Grouper, Aethaloperca rogaa, Groupers, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/groupers/redmouth-grouper
---

# Redmouth Grouper (*Aethaloperca rogaa*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Groupers (*Epinephelidae*)
- **Size:** up to 60 cm
- **Depth:** 1-60 m
- **Diet:** Piscivore
- **Activity:** Diurnal
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Caves, overhangs and wrecks, close to shelter
- **Reproduction:** Broadcast spawner, Protogynous hermaphrodite

## How to recognise it

- uniformly dark brown to black fish, deep-bodied and strongly compressed
- inside of the mouth and throat bright orange-red, visible when it gapes
- pale margin along the rear of the tail, sometimes worn away
- length up to 60 cm

A dark, deep-bodied grouper that reads as a black silhouette hanging in the mouth of a cave. Up to 60 cm (24 in), and shaped unlike any other grouper here - flattened side to side rather than round in section, which is what lets it work inside crevices and under ledges where the rest of the family cannot go.

The name is in the mouth. Open, the throat and mouth lining are bright orange-red, and a gaping fish looks briefly like a different animal. Whether the color signals anything is unknown; it is visible only at moments when the fish is yawning or feeding.

It hunts small fish, particularly the glassfish and cardinalfish that shoal inside caves, which is another reason for the shape: a predator that lives in the same cave as its prey needs to fit.

It is a common resident of wrecks throughout this sea, holding the same hold or corridor for years, and it will approach a diver closely enough to be uncomfortable for a fish that is nearly all mouth.

## Also known as

- **English:** redmouth grouper, Red-flushed Cod, Red-flushed Grouper
- **Arabic:** هامور أحمر الفم, Hamour, Sheneenoh
- **Hebrew:** דקרן אדום-לוע
- **French:** Vieille Rogaa, Vieille roga
- **Italian:** Cernia bocca rossa, Cernia soldato
- **German:** Rotmaul-Zackenbarsch
- **Portuguese:** Garoupa-de-boca-vermelha
- **Dutch:** Roodbektandbaars
- **Czech:** kanic rudotlamý
- **Japanese:** クロハタ, Kurohata
- **Chinese:** 煙鱠, 煙鱸
- **Russian:** Красноротая эталоперка, Красноротый групер
- **DA:** Rødmundet koralbars
- **SOM:** Caalo
- **SW:** Chewa
- **TH:** ปลากะรังเลือดนก

## Scientific synonyms

- *Aethaloperca rogan* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Aethaloperca rogga* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Aethaloperca rogoa* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Aetheloperca rogaa* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Aetholoperca rogaa* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Athaloperca rogae* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Cephalopholis rogaa* (Forsskål, 1775)
- *Perca lunaria* Forsskål, 1775
- *Perca rogaa* Forsskål, 1775

## Range

Comoros, Djibouti, East Africa, Eritrea, Federal Republic of Somalia, Indian Ocean, Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, Red Sea, Republic of Mauritius, Seychelles, South Africa, Tanzania

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*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/groupers/redmouth-grouper)*
*Updated: August 13, 2026*