---
title: Raggy Scorpionfish (Scorpaenopsis venosa)
scientific_name: Scorpaenopsis venosa
common_name: Raggy Scorpionfish
taxon: Scorpionfishes
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2024-10-30T21:34:30.845Z
updated: 2026-08-14T20:31:13.324Z
tags: Raggy Scorpionfish, Scorpaenopsis venosa, Scorpionfishes, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/scorpionfishes/raggy-scorpionfish
---

# Raggy Scorpionfish (*Scorpaenopsis venosa*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Scorpionfishes (*Scorpaenidae*)
- **Size:** up to 25 cm
- **Depth:** 1-40 m
- **Diet:** Carnivore
- **Activity:** Nocturnal
- **Rarity:** Uncommon
- **Habitat:** Coral rock and rubble, sitting in the open
- **Reproduction:** Broadcast spawner, Gonochoric
- **Hazard:** Dangerous, Venomous
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- heavy scorpionfish with an unusually ragged, tattered outline
- skin flaps in irregular clumps rather than an even fringe
- color from deep red through brown to pale gray, matching the sponge or rock it sits on
- length up to 25 cm

Twenty-five centimeters (10 in) of fish with a deliberately tattered outline - irregular clumps of skin rather than a neat fringe, so that nothing about the shape resolves into an animal.

Color is chosen rather than fixed. A raggy scorpionfish sitting on red sponge is red, one on coral rubble is gray-brown, and the change takes days rather than seconds. Individuals that move to a new patch of reef repaint themselves to it.

The hunting is the family's: hold still, wait, and strike anything small that comes within a body length, with a mouth that opens into a volume rather than a bite.

It is one of the species most often mistaken for a stonefish by divers, and the distinction matters less than people think - both are venomous, both are best left alone, and both are hot-water cases followed by a doctor. What actually matters is not putting a hand down without looking.

## Also known as

- **English:** raggy scorpionfish, Yellow-nose Scorpionfish
- **French:** Poisson-scorpion à guenilles
- **Italian:** Falso pesce pietra raggiato, Pesce scorpione raggiato, Scorfano raggiato
- **German:** Fetzen-Drachenkopf
- **Spanish:** Pez Escorpión harapiento
- **Czech:** paropušnice cárovitá
- **Japanese:** ヒュウガカサゴ, Hyugakasago
- **Chinese:** 枕嵴石狗公, 枕脊擬鮋, 石狗公

## Scientific synonyms

- *Scorpaena durbanensis* Gilchrist & Thompson, 1909
- *Scorpaena novaeguinae* Cuvier, 1829
- *Scorpaena novae-guinae* Cuvier, 1829
- *Scorpaena rosea* Day, 1868
- *Scorpaena venosa* Cuvier, 1829
- *Scorpaenopsis novaeguineae* (Cuvier, 1829)
- *Scorpaenopsis novae-guineae* (Cuvier, 1829)
- *Scorpaenopsis palmeri* Ogilby, 1910
- *Scorpaenopsis rosea* (Day, 1868)
- *Scorpaeopsis venosa* (Cuvier, 1829)

## Range

Indian Ocean, Mozambique, South Africa

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