Bluefin gurnard
Fish · Last reviewed 2026-08-25
The gurnard of New Zealand and southern Australia — brilliant blue-edged pectoral fins, and six free rays it uses to walk on and taste the seabed.
Safety: injury while handling fish — minor injury.
Catching Bluefin gurnard
Everything here on fishing for it. Each entry opens the page behind it.
- Ground
A gurnard walks. The lowest three rays of each pectoral fin are free of the web and modified into stiff finger-like feelers, and the fish uses them to move across the bottom and to taste it — they carry chemosensory cells, so it is feeling and smelling with what look like legs.
*Chelidonichthys kumu* is the southern-hemisphere member of the genus the British red and tub gurnards belong to. It is red to reddish-brown above with a pale belly and, when it spreads them, enormous fan-like pectoral fins marked in brilliant blue and blue-green — which is where `bluefin gurnard` comes from and which is one of the more startling things to come over the side of a boat. New Zealand's Māori name is kumukumu, which is also the species name.
FishBase records 60 cm, 1.5 kg and an age of fifteen years, demersal in marine and brackish water over a depth range of 1 to 200 m and usually 75 to 150 m, from Mozambique and the Cape through Australia and New Zealand with records from Japan, Korea and Hong Kong. It has low resilience.
It is a major recreational and commercial species in New Zealand, taken on baited bottom rigs over sand and mixed ground, frequently alongside snapper and tarakihi. It is excellent eating. And like the other gurnards it grunts audibly with its swim bladder when landed, which combined with the walking and the blue fins makes it a fish most people remember catching.
Identification
No photograph of Bluefin gurnard 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
- Chelidonichthys kumu
- Family
- Triglidae
- Water
- Saltwater, Brackish
- Conservation status
- Least Concern
- Regions
- New Zealand, Australia, East & Southern Africa, East Asia, Indo-Pacific
- Huge fan-shaped pectoral fins marked in brilliant blue and blue-green, spread when the fish is alarmed or landed.
- The three lowest rays of each pectoral fin free of the web and modified into stiff finger-like feelers used to walk on and taste the bottom.
- Red to reddish-brown above with a pale belly, and a heavily armoured bony head.
- It grunts audibly with the swim bladder when landed, as the gurnards generally do.
- FishBase records a maximum of 60 cm, 1.5 kg and an age of 15 years.
Size
- Typical
- 300–700 g (11 oz–1.5 lb)
- Large
- 1–1.4 kg (2.2–3 lb)
Exceptional: FishBase records a maximum of 60 cm, 1.5 kg and an age of 15 years
Lifecycle and reproduction
Demersal in marine and brackish water over a depth range of 1 to 200 m and usually 75 to 150 m, on sand, mud and mixed ground. FishBase gives it LOW resilience and a maximum age of fifteen years, which is longer-lived than a fish of this size suggests.
Not detailed on the FishBase record beyond the age data. The fifteen-year maximum age on a fish of a kilo or so is the fact worth carrying: it is slower-replacing than its abundance in a catch implies.
Feeding and senses
Takes crustaceans, worms, molluscs and small fish located by walking the free pectoral rays across the bottom — those rays carry chemosensory cells, so the fish is tasting the seabed as it moves over it. That is why it is caught on baited bottom rigs and almost never on a lure worked in midwater.
Chemoreception through the modified pectoral rays, which is an unusual enough sense to be the defining fact about how it feeds. Sight matters less than it does for the fish it shares ground with, and scent-rich baits work accordingly.
Through the year
Present on the same ground year-round with movement between depths through the year. In New Zealand it is a mainstay of inshore bottom fishing in most months.
Distribution
Indo-West Pacific: Delagoa Bay, Mozambique to the Cape, South Africa; common in Australia and New Zealand and reported from Japan and Korea. Also reported from Hong Kong
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
A major New Zealand recreational species and a common Australian and South African one, taken on baited bottom rigs over sand and mixed ground, frequently in the same session as snapper and tarakihi. It is excellent eating and it is one of the few fish an angler catches that is memorable for how it behaves in the hand rather than for how it fought.
Handling and returning
A heavily armoured bony head with sharp spines on the gill covers and preopercle, and stiff dorsal spines. Grip across the body behind the head with the fins folded, unhook with pliers, and keep fingers away from the head entirely — the head is where every gurnard injury comes from.
Safety
Injury while handling fish — Minor injury
The bony head carries sharp spines on the gill covers and preopercle, and the dorsal spines are stiff. A hand closed around the head of a gurnard is cut by the head rather than by the fins.
What reduces it: Hold across the body behind the head with the pectorals folded, unhook with pliers, and never grip a gurnard by the head.
Where to go next
Similar and related fish
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 Chelidonichthys kumu.States this directlyPassage read and verified
- The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species — International Union for Conservation of Nature (Conservation authority)Relied on for: The Least Concern assessment for Chelidonichthys kumu, assessed 04 February 2009.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- 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 3 connections on this page are here, and the sources
Similar and related fish
Backed by research — 1 connection
Supported by peer-reviewed research or fisheries science. The sources are listed and can be checked.
Red gurnard
Chelidonichthys kumu reaches 60 cm and 1.5 kg in the Indo-West Pacific with brilliant blue-marked pectoral fins; Chelidonichthys cuculus is the smaller northern European red gurnard. Both walk on three free pectoral rays carrying chemosensory cells and both grunt audibly when landed.
- FishBase: a global information system on fishes — Froese, R. and D. Pauly, eds. — FishBase Consortium (Scientific institute)Relied on for: The morphology, size, depth range and distribution that separate these two species from one another.States this directlyPassage read and verified
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.
Ledgering
Taken on baited bottom rigs over sand and mixed ground, frequently alongside snapper and tarakihi in New Zealand. It locates prey with chemosensory cells on the free pectoral rays it walks with, so a scent-rich static bait is what finds it and a lure in midwater is not.
- 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.
Inshore ground
Demersal in marine and brackish water over a depth range of 1 to 200 m and usually 75 to 150 m, on sand, mud and mixed ground from Mozambique through Australia and New Zealand.
- 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 Chelidonichthys kumu.States this directlyPassage read and verified
How FishingHQ labels evidence is explained in the evidence policy.