---
title: Honeycomb Moray (Gymnothorax favagineus)
scientific_name: Gymnothorax favagineus
common_name: Honeycomb Moray
taxon: Moray eel
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2024-10-25T18:18:41.121Z
updated: 2026-08-14T08:42:18.267Z
tags: Honeycomb Moray, Gymnothorax favagineus, Moray eel, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/moray-eel/honeycomb-moray
---

# Honeycomb Moray (*Gymnothorax favagineus*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Moray eel (*Muraenidae*)
- **Size:** up to 3 m
- **Depth:** 1-50 m
- **Diet:** Carnivore
- **Activity:** Nocturnal
- **Rarity:** Uncommon
- **Habitat:** Coral reef and drop-offs, in caves and ledges
- **Reproduction:** Broadcast spawner, Gonochoric
- **Hazard:** Dangerous, Poisonous
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- pale body covered in dense black polygonal spots, honeycomb-like
- spots larger toward the tail, smaller and denser on the head
- very large - the biggest moray most divers here will see
- length up to 3 m

Three meters (10 ft) of pale eel covered in black polygons, filling a ledge with its head out and its mouth working. The gaping is breathing, not threat - a moray has to pump water over its gills by opening and closing its jaws, and the sight has given the family a reputation it does not deserve.

What it does deserve credit for is teamwork. Morays of this genus hunt with groupers, and the arrangement is real cooperation rather than opportunism: the grouper approaches a moray's hole and signals with a head shake, the two hunt together, and prey driven out of a crevice by the eel meets the grouper in open water, while prey fleeing the grouper meets the eel in the crevice. Both catch more than either does alone. It is one of the few documented cases of cooperative hunting between species outside mammals and birds.

Behind the jaws sits a second set of them. Pharyngeal jaws in the throat launch forward, grip the prey and drag it back - an animal that cannot suck food in the way most fish do, so it built a ratchet instead.

It hunts at night for fish and octopus. Bites happen to hands in holes and to spearfishermen; large individuals in some regions carry ciguatoxins.

## Also known as

- **English:** laced moray, Tessellate Moray, Honeycomb Moray Eel
- **Hebrew:** ניבן היערה
- **French:** Murène à taches noires, Murène Nid D'abeilles, Congre Mousquee
- **Italian:** Murena a nido d'ape, Murena favo, Murena tassellata
- **German:** Netzmuräne
- **Spanish:** Morena de puntos negros
- **Portuguese:** Moreia-leopardo
- **Dutch:** Grote netmurene
- **Polish:** murena cętkowana
- **Czech:** muréna síťovaná
- **Japanese:** アマダレウツボ, インディアンモレイ, ヒョウモンウツボ
- **Chinese:** 大斑裸胸鯙, 大點花, 糬鰻
- **Ukrainian:** Мурена плямиста
- **DA:** Leopardmuræne
- **TGL:** Malibanos
- **TH:** ปลาหลดหินลายจุดดำ, ปลาหลดหินลายตาข่าย

## Scientific synonyms

- *Enchelycore favagineus* (Bloch & Schneider, 1801)
- *Gymnothorax favagiensis* (Bloch & Schneider, 1801)
- *Gymnothorax permistus* (Smith, 1962)
- *Gymnothorax tesselatus* (Richardson, 1845)
- *Gymnothorax tessellata* (Richardson, 1845)
- *Gymnothorax tessellatus* (Richardson, 1845)
- *Lycodontis favagineus* (Bloch & Schneider, 1801)
- *Lycodontis permistus* Smith, 1962
- *Lycodontis tessellata* (Richardson, 1845)
- *Muraena tessellata* Richardson, 1845

## Range

Comoros, Federal Republic of Somalia, Indian Ocean, Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique, Seychelles, South Africa, Tanzania

---

*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/moray-eel/honeycomb-moray)*
*Updated: August 14, 2026*