---
title: Orange-striped Triggerfish (Balistapus undulatus)
scientific_name: Balistapus undulatus
common_name: Orange-striped Triggerfish
taxon: Triggerfishes
conservation_status: LC - Least Concern
published: 2023-12-30T22:45:29.385Z
updated: 2026-08-31T20:25:29.340Z
tags: Orange-striped Triggerfish, Balistapus undulatus, Triggerfishes, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/triggerfishes/orange-striped-triggerfish
---

# Orange-striped Triggerfish (*Balistapus undulatus*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Triggerfishes (*Balistidae*)
- **Size:** up to 30 cm
- **Depth:** 1-60 m
- **Diet:** Omnivore
- **Activity:** Diurnal
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Coral-rich reef with rubble patches nearby
- **Reproduction:** Egg layer, Gonochoric
- **Hazard:** Dangerous
- **Conservation status:** LC - Least Concern

## How to recognise it

- dark green body ruled with curved orange lines running back from the snout
- orange band across the base of the tail and a yellow patch behind the mouth
- males lose the orange lines across the snout, females keep them
- up to 30 cm

It eats what nothing else can open. A sea urchin is turned over and attacked through the soft underside where the spines are short; coral branches are bitten off; thick-shelled molluscs are crushed. The tool is eight heavy incisors mounted on a short, powerful skull, and it is what lets a fish of 30 cm (12 in) make a living out of food that is armored against everything its size.

That jaw is also why it is one of the more aggressive animals on the reef for its size, and why the aggression is worth respecting. The nest is a shallow crater in sand or rubble, and the territory the female defends stands on it as a cone that widens toward the surface. Swimming up keeps you inside that cone the whole way, and swimming up and away puts you further in rather than further out. Leave sideways, stay low, keep the fish in sight, and put your fins between the two of you. She charges anything inside it and the bite takes chunks out of fins.

The fish itself is dark green, ruled with curved orange lines that run back from the snout across the whole body, with an orange band at the base of the tail and a yellow patch behind the mouth. Sexes are separable if you look at the snout: in females the orange lines cross it, in adult males they fade out before they get there. Very few triggerfish can be sexed in the water at all.

## Also known as

- **English:** orange-lined triggerfish, Leubiem kunèng, orangestriped
- **French:** Baliste ondulé, Baliste strié
- **Italian:** Pesce balestra striato di arancio
- **German:** Orangestreifen-Drückerfisch
- **Spanish:** Ballesta Picasso de Rayas Anaranjadas
- **Portuguese:** Cangulo-undulado
- **Dutch:** Groene Trekkervis
- **Czech:** ostenec oranžovoproužkatý
- **Japanese:** クマドリ, Kumadori
- **Chinese:** 波紋鈎鱗魨, 波纹钩鳞鲀, 鉤板機魨
- **Russian:** Оранжевоперый спинорог
- **CA:** Ballesta folrada
- **DA:** Bølgelinjet aftrækkerfisk
- **FI:** Aaltosäppikala
- **GL:** Peixe porco ondulado
- **MAL:** Karatti, കരട്ടി, കരറ്റി
- **MSA:** Ayam laut, Jebong
- **SW:** Kikande
- **TGL:** Pakoy, Papakol
- **TH:** ปลาวัวลายส้ม, ปลาวัวหางเหลือง

## Scientific synonyms

- *Balistapus undulates* (Park, 1797)
- *Balistes aculeatus minor* Forsskål, 1775
- *Balistes aculeatus viridis* Bennett, 1828
- *Balistes lineatus* Bloch & Schneider, 1801
- *Balistes minor* Forsskål, 1775
- *Balistes porcatus* Gronow, 1854
- *Balistes sesquilineatus* Lay & Bennett, 1939
- *Balistes undulatus* Park, 1797
- *Balistopus undulatus* (Park, 1797)

## Range

Djibouti, Federal Republic of Somalia, Indian Ocean, Kenya, Mozambique, Red Sea, Seychelles, South Africa, Western Indian Ocean

---

*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/fishes/bony-fishes/triggerfishes/orange-striped-triggerfish)*
*Updated: August 31, 2026*