---
title: Hooded Oyster (Saccostrea cuccullata)
scientific_name: Saccostrea cuccullata
common_name: Hooded Oyster
taxon: Oysters
published: 2026-08-04T10:47:54.573Z
updated: 2026-08-20T17:09:45.792Z
tags: Hooded Oyster, Saccostrea cuccullata, Oysters, Red Sea, Marine Life, Diving
url: https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/invertebrate/molluscs/oysters/hooded-oyster
---

# Hooded Oyster (*Saccostrea cuccullata*)

## Quick facts

- **Group:** Oysters (*Ostreida*)
- **Size:** up to 10 cm
- **Depth:** 0-5 m
- **Diet:** Filter feeder
- **Activity:** Cathemeral
- **Rarity:** Common
- **Habitat:** Intertidal rock, reef flats and jetty pilings

## How to recognise it

- cemented to bare rock in the tidal zone, often in dense beds
- deeply cupped lower valve with a flat lid-like upper valve
- margin with small blunt teeth; interior white, dark at the edge

A heavy, deeply cupped rock oyster that lives cemented to bare stone in the tidal zone, where it forms crusts and dense beds rather than growing as scattered individuals. The lower valve is thick and hollowed out, the upper flat enough to work as a lid, and small blunt teeth run along the inside of the margin. The outside is gray and irregular, sculpted by whatever it grew against; the interior is white with a dark border. Height reaches about 10 cm (4 in), though crowded animals stay smaller and grow taller than wide.

The species tolerates hours of exposure to air, closing its valves to hold water inside and reopening to filter as soon as the tide returns - which is why it dominates the splash and intertidal zone while other oysters stay submerged. It settles on shoreline rock, reef flats, jetty pilings and mangrove roots down to about 5 m (16 ft). Along the Red Sea coast it is harvested locally for food and used as bait, and its shells build up into hard, sharp pavements that are easy to cut a hand or a fin on.

## Also known as

- **English:** Natal rock oyster, Rock oyster, hooded oyster
- **French:** huître-capuchon
- **German:** Südafrikanische Felsenauster, Deckel-Auster, Deckel-Felsenauster
- **Spanish:** ostión capuchón
- **Portuguese:** Bivalve, ostra
- **Chinese:** 僧帽牡蠣, 岩蚵
- **Russian:** Скальная устрица
- **KO:** 재석굴

## Scientific synonyms

- *Crassostrea cuccullata* (Born, 1778)
- *Crassostrea cucullata* [sic]
- *Gryphaea cuccullata* (Born, 1778)
- *Ostrea cornucopia* [sic]
- *Ostrea cornucopiae* Gmelin, 1791
- *Ostrea cuccullata* Born, 1778
- *Ostrea cucullata* [sic]
- *Ostrea purpurea* [Lightfoot], 1786
- *Saccostrea cucullata* [sic]

## Range

Angola, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Kenya, Sao Tome and Principe, South Africa, South Atlantic Ocean, Tanzania

---

*Source: [Red Sea Creatures](https://redseacreatures.com/taxon/invertebrate/molluscs/oysters/hooded-oyster)*
*Updated: August 20, 2026*