---
title: Bandedfin Scorpionfish (Scorpaenopsis vittapinna)
scientific_name: Scorpaenopsis vittapinna
common_name: Bandedfin Scorpionfish
taxon: Scorpionfishes
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2024-10-30T21:26:19.760Z
updated: 2026-08-14T20:13:10.442Z
tags: Bandedfin Scorpionfish, Scorpaenopsis vittapinna, Scorpionfishes, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/scorpionfishes/bandedfin-scorpionfish
---

# Bandedfin Scorpionfish (*Scorpaenopsis vittapinna*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Scorpionfishes (*Scorpaenidae*)
- **Size:** up to 9 cm
- **Depth:** 2-30 m
- **Diet:** Carnivore
- **Activity:** Nocturnal
- **Rarity:** Uncommon
- **Habitat:** Rubble and dead coral on shallow reef
- **Reproduction:** Broadcast spawner, Gonochoric
- **Hazard:** Dangerous, Venomous
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- very small scorpionfish, mottled brown with banded pectoral fins
- skin flaps over the eyes and along the jaw
- sits openly on rubble, relying entirely on not being recognized
- length up to 9 cm

Nine centimeters (3.5 in) of scorpionfish on open rubble, banded across the pectoral fins and otherwise indistinguishable from the bottom it is sitting on.

At this size the animal is prey as much as predator, and everything about it is aimed at not being identified: skin flaps that break every straight line, a color that shifts to match the substrate over days, and total stillness. A fish this small cannot afford to be found by a grouper.

It hunts at night, taking shrimps, amphipods and fish larvae with a strike that is over in milliseconds - the same mechanism as its 40 cm relatives, scaled down.

The spines carry the same venom. The sting from a fish this size is painful rather than dangerous, but it is delivered from a rock that a hand came down on, which is how almost all of them happen.

## Also known as

- **English:** Bandfin Scorpionfish, Bigmouth Scorpionfish
- **Czech:** paropušnice pruhoploutvá
- **Japanese:** コガタオニカサゴ, Kogataonikasago
- **Chinese:** 沙薑虎, 石崇, 石狗公
- **FIJ:** delasiga

## Scientific synonyms

- *Scorpaenopsis vittipinna* Randall & Eschmeyer, 2002

---

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