---
title: Forktail Rabbitfish (Siganus argenteus)
scientific_name: Siganus argenteus
common_name: Forktail Rabbitfish
taxon: Rabbitfishes
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2024-10-31T22:28:04.165Z
updated: 2026-08-13T22:55:03.556Z
tags: Forktail Rabbitfish, Siganus argenteus, Rabbitfishes, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/rabbitfishes/forktail-rabbitfish
---

# Forktail Rabbitfish (*Siganus argenteus*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Rabbitfishes (*Siganidae*)
- **Size:** up to 40 cm
- **Depth:** 0-40 m
- **Diet:** Herbivore
- **Activity:** Diurnal
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Reef flats, lagoons and open slopes, in schools
- **Reproduction:** Broadcast spawner, Gonochoric
- **Hazard:** Dangerous, Venomous
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- silver-blue body with fine yellow lines, deeply forked tail
- no bold spots or blotches
- in fast-moving schools, unlike the paired reef rabbitfishes
- length up to 40 cm

The rabbitfish that schools. Where the reef species move in pairs, this one gathers in fast silver schools that sweep across open bottom and lagoon, cropping algae as they go and rarely stopping.

That difference is worth knowing because it changes what you are looking at: a lone rabbitfish beside coral is one of the paired species, and a school of a hundred moving over sand is this one. It is also the rabbitfish most often caught for food across the region, precisely because it can be netted in numbers.

Every spine on it is venomous - thirteen in the dorsal fin, seven in the anal, four in the pelvics, all grooved and connected to venom glands. The fish is harmless in the water and dangerous in a net, which is the pattern for the whole family.

Like its squaretail relative it went north through the Suez Canal, and it is now established in the eastern Mediterranean, where the two together have stripped algal forests from long stretches of coast.

## Also known as

- **English:** forktail rabbitfish, Schooling Rabbit-fish, streamlined spinefoot
- **Hebrew:** סיכן פצול-זנב
- **French:** Poisson-lapin argenté, Sigan vermiculé, Vrai picot
- **Italian:** Pesce coniglio coda a forbice, Pesce coniglio argentato
- **German:** Silber-Kaninchenfisch
- **Portuguese:** Peixe-coelho-prateado
- **Dutch:** Zilveren Konijnvis
- **Czech:** králíčkovec stříbřitý
- **Japanese:** ハナアイゴ, Hanaaigo
- **Chinese:** 銀臭肚魚
- **CA:** Gitano platejat
- **DA:** Gaffelhalet kaninfisk
- **FI:** Kuviokaniinikala
- **FIJ:** nuqa roro
- **MSA:** Ketang lada, Belaris, Belibas
- **TAH:** marava
- **TGL:** Alama, Balawis, Indongan
- **TH:** ปลาใบขนุนสีเงิน

## Scientific synonyms

- *Amphacanthus argenteus* Quoy & Gaimard, 1825
- *Amphacanthus mertensii* Valenciennes, 1835
- *Amphacanthus rostratus* Valenciennes, 1835
- *Siganas rostrata* (Valenciennes, 1835)
- *Siganus argebteys* (Quoy & Gaimard, 1825)
- *Siganus rostratus* (Valenciennes, 1835)
- *Siganus vitianus* (Sauvage, 1882)
- *Teuthis argentea* (Quoy & Gaimard, 1825)
- *Teuthis oligosticta* Kner, 1868
- *Teuthis rostrata* (Valenciennes, 1835)
- *Teuthis rostratus* (Valenciennes, 1835)
- *Teuthis rostrytus* (Valenciennes, 1835)
- *Teuthis vitianus* Sauvage, 1882

## Range

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

---

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