Bluenose warehou
Fish · Last reviewed 2026-08-25
A deep southern-ocean fish of the 260-to-490-metre band, reaching 63 kilos — one of the prizes of Australasian deep dropping, and slow enough growing to be easy to overfish.
Safety: fish welfare — can cause serious injury or death.
Catching Bluenose warehou
Everything here on fishing for it. Each entry opens the page behind it.
- Ground
Bluenose is what deep dropping in New Zealand and southern Australia is largely for. It lives on and around deep reef, pinnacle and seamount, FishBase records it over a depth range of 40 to 1500 m and usually between 260 and 490, and it reaches 140 cm and 63 kg — a genuinely large fish taken on a genuinely long line.
It is a heavy, deep-bodied, blue-black to charcoal fish with a large eye, a blunt head and a thick caudal peduncle, and the Australian trade name blue-eye trevalla describes the eye rather than any relationship to the trevallies, which it has none of. It is a centrolophid, a medusafish, and the family's juveniles famously associate with drifting weed and jellyfish before the adults go deep.
The fishery for it is electric-reel and heavy-hand-line work over structure in several hundred metres of water, on large baits — squid, whole fish, cut baits — and increasingly on deep jigs. It is prized eating and commercially valuable, and both of those facts sit alongside a maximum age of fifteen years on the FishBase record and a species that concentrates on specific deep features, which is the combination that makes a seamount fishable out.
Everything about fish from that depth is governed by barotrauma. A bluenose brought up from four hundred metres cannot be returned in any meaningful sense, so the decision about what to keep is made before the line goes down and not after the fish is at the rail.
Identification
No photograph of Bluenose warehou has passed identity review yet, so none is shown. FishingHQ publishes a species photograph only once somebody has confirmed the animal in it against the species record’s own diagnostic features.
- Scientific name
- Hyperoglyphe antarctica
- Family
- Centrolophidae
- Water
- Saltwater
- Conservation status
- Not assessed
- Regions
- New Zealand, Australia, East & Southern Africa, Central & South America
- Heavy, deep-bodied and blue-black to charcoal, with a paler belly and a blunt rounded head.
- A conspicuously large eye, which is what the Australian trade name blue-eye refers to.
- A thick muscular caudal peduncle and a broad forked tail — a fish built to hold station in current at depth.
- Not a trevally: it is a centrolophid medusafish, and it shares nothing with the Carangidae beyond a trade name.
- FishBase records a maximum of 140 cm and 63 kg, and an age of 15 years.
Size
- Typical
- 3–10 kg (6.6–22 lb)
- Large
- 15–30 kg (33–66 lb)
Exceptional: FishBase records a maximum of 140 cm and 63 kg, and an age of 15 years
Lifecycle and reproduction
Benthopelagic over a depth range of 40 to 1500 m and usually 260 to 490 m, concentrating on deep reef, pinnacle and seamount. Medium resilience and a maximum age of about 15 years. Juvenile centrolophids associate with drifting weed and jellyfish at the surface before moving deep, which is a striking difference between the two halves of one life.
Not detailed on the FishBase record for this species. What the depth and aggregation behaviour together establish is the fishery-management problem: a fish that concentrates on specific deep features is findable, and a findable aggregation of a slow-maturing fish is the classic pattern behind a seamount fishery collapsing quickly.
Feeding and senses
Takes fish, squid and pelagic invertebrates over and around deep structure. In the dark at three or four hundred metres it hunts by scent and by lateral line as much as by sight, which is why large oily baits and slow deep jigs both work on it.
The enlarged eye is a low-light adaptation, and at its usual depth there is very little light to adapt to. Scent, vibration and the lateral line do most of the work, which is why a bait that has been down for a while outfishes one that has just arrived.
Through the year
Available on the same deep features year-round rather than running seasonally, with the fishing governed by weather and the ability to hold a boat over a mark in deep water rather than by the calendar.
Distribution
Southwest Atlantic: Argentina. Southeast Atlantic and Western Indian Ocean: South Africa. Southwest Pacific: New Zealand and Australia (including Western Australia)
This is a biological range — where the species occurs, not a prediction that you will catch one. To browse the fishing geography FishingHQ holds, start at fishing places.
Why anglers care
One of the principal targets of Australasian deep dropping, taken on electric reels and heavy hand lines over deep reef, pinnacle and seamount in several hundred metres of water, on squid, whole fish and cut baits and on deep jigs. It is prized eating and commercially valuable. The fishery is dominated by two facts: the fish concentrates on specific features, and nothing brought up from that depth can be returned.
Handling and returning
Heavy, spined and awkward, and always suffering severe barotrauma. Plan the catch rather than the release: on this ground catch-and-release is not an available option, so the bag decision is made before fishing. Handle a large fish with support under the body and expect it to be dead on arrival regardless of intent.
Safety
Fish welfare — Can cause serious injury or death
Fish taken from 260 to 490 m arrive with catastrophic barotrauma — swim bladder expanded, stomach everted, eyes protruded. There is no version of returning one that works. A boat that keeps fishing a mark and returning the unwanted fish is killing them all.
What reduces it: Decide the bag before dropping, stop when it is reached, and move off the mark rather than continuing to fish it. Do not treat deep dropping as a catch-and-release fishery, because on this ground it is not one.
Where to go next
Where it lives
More fish
Not related to this page — just the rest of the section. There is little else joined to this subject yet, and a short page should still lead somewhere.
Sources and evidence
- FishBase: a global information system on fishes — Froese, R. and D. Pauly, eds. — FishBase Consortium (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Family, maximum size, depth range, environment, distribution and the IUCN assessment for Hyperoglyphe antarctica. FishBase records no IUCN assessment for this species.States this directlyPassage read and verified
- FAO Species Identification Guides for Fishery Purposes and the FAO Species Catalogues — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Identification, distribution, habitat and fishery description from the FAO species identification guides for fishery purposes.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: The widely restated practitioner account of how this species is fished — tackle, method and the ground it is taken over.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Why the 2 connections on this page are here, and the sources
How it is caught
What experienced anglers do — 1 connection
Widely and independently recommended by experienced anglers and specialist sources. This is real angling knowledge, not proof: controlled evidence for it is limited, and FishingHQ records it as convention rather than as a demonstrated effect.
Deep-drop fishing
Fished over deep reef, pinnacle and seamount in its usual band of 260 to 490 m, on large squid and fish baits and increasingly on deep jigs. The depth is what defines the method and it is also why release does not work on this ground.
- FAO Species Identification Guides for Fishery Purposes and the FAO Species Catalogues — Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Identification, distribution, habitat and fishery description from the FAO species identification guides for fishery purposes.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- General angling website restatements of established technique — Various (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: The widely restated practitioner account of how this species is fished.Background and mechanism onlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Where it lives
Backed by research — 1 connection
Supported by peer-reviewed research or fisheries science. The sources are listed and can be checked.
Open ocean
Recorded as benthopelagic over a depth range of 40 to 1500 m and usually 260 to 490 m, concentrating on deep structure across the southern hemisphere.
- FishBase: a global information system on fishes — Froese, R. and D. Pauly, eds. — FishBase Consortium (Scientific institute)Relied on for: Environment, depth range, habitat association and distribution for Hyperoglyphe antarctica.States this directlyPassage read and verified
How FishingHQ labels evidence is explained in the evidence policy.