---
title: Yellowhead Moray (Gymnothorax rueppelliae)
scientific_name: Gymnothorax rueppelliae
common_name: Yellowhead Moray
taxon: Moray eel
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2024-10-25T18:45:44.150Z
updated: 2026-08-14T23:33:07.195Z
tags: Yellowhead Moray, Gymnothorax rueppelliae, Moray eel, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/moray-eel/yellowhead-moray
---

# Yellowhead Moray (*Gymnothorax rueppelliae*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Moray eel (*Muraenidae*)
- **Size:** up to 80 cm
- **Depth:** 0-40 m
- **Diet:** Carnivore
- **Activity:** Nocturnal
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Shallow coral reef, in holes and under coral heads
- **Reproduction:** Broadcast spawner, Gonochoric
- **Hazard:** Dangerous
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- brown body with pale-edged dark blotches in irregular rows
- yellow-brown head, paler than the body
- small eye set well forward on a short snout
- length up to 80 cm

A common shallow moray with a pale yellowish head and blotched body, filling a hole in a coral head with its jaws working.

It has a second set of jaws in its throat, and they move. Most fish feed by suction - the mouth opens and water carries the prey in - but an eel wedged in a hole cannot generate that flow. So the pharyngeal jaws, which in other fish sit still and grind, are mounted on long muscles that launch them forward into the mouth, grip the prey and haul it back down the throat. It is a ratchet, it works with no water movement at all, and it was only filmed for the first time in 2007.

That mechanism is why a moray bite is hard to escape: the animal is not holding on with the front teeth alone.

Eighty centimeters (32 in). It hunts small fish and octopus at night among coral. The danger flag is about hands in holes and about spearfishing - nothing here has any interest in a diver who keeps their fingers to themselves.

## Also known as

- **English:** banded moray, Rüppell's Moray Eel, Black Barred Eel
- **French:** Murène à bandes brunes, Murène à tête jaune
- **Japanese:** クラカケウツボ
- **Chinese:** 寬帶裸胸鯙, 糬鰻, 薯鰻
- **TAH:** puhi 'oiro

## Scientific synonyms

- *Dalophis rueppelliae* McClelland, 1844
- *Gymnothorax leucacme* Jenkins, 1903
- *Gymnothorax petelli* (Bleeker, 1856)
- *Gymnothorax ruepelliae* (McClelland, 1844)
- *Gymnothorax rüeppelliae* (McClelland, 1844)
- *Gymnothorax rueppellii* (McClelland, 1844)
- *Gymnothorax ruppeli* (McClelland, 1844)
- *Gymnothorax ruppelii* (McClelland, 1844)
- *Gymnothorax ruppelli* (McClelland, 1844)
- *Gymnothorax ruppelliae* (McClelland, 1844)
- *Gymnothorax ruppellii* (McClelland, 1844)
- *Gymnothorax signifer* Bliss, 1883
- *Gymnothorax waialuae* Snyder, 1904
- *Lycodontis petelli* (Bleeker, 1856)
- *Lycodontis rueppelli* (McClelland, 1844)
- *Lycodontis rueppelliae* (McClelland, 1844)
- *Lycodontis ruppelli* (McClelland, 1845)
- *Muraena interrupta* Kaup, 1856
- *Muraena nigrolineata* Kaup, 1856
- *Muraena petelli* Bleeker, 1856
- *Muraena ruppelli* (McClelland, 1844)
- *Muraena umbrofasciata* Rüppell, 1852
- *Sidera chlevastes* Jordan & Gilbert, 1883

## Range

Federal Republic of Somalia, Indian Ocean, Madagascar, Mozambique, Red Sea, Seychelles

---

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