Yellowmouth barracuda
Fish · Last reviewed 2026-08-25
The barracuda of the eastern Atlantic islands, named by every Lanzarote source and by none of them correctly — the Canary fish is not the great barracuda.
Safety: species that bite — can cause injury needing treatment.
Catching Yellowmouth barracuda
Everything here on fishing for it. Each entry opens the page behind it.
- Where
- 1 place FishingHQ documents — strongest claim anywhere: repeatedly reported · From the shore
Ask what is caught in the Canaries and barracuda comes back from almost every source, including the island authorities themselves. The word hides a substitution that matters. The great barracuda, *Sphyraena barracuda*, is a fish of the tropical western Atlantic and the Indo-Pacific; the fish Canary sources mean is *Sphyraena viridensis*, the yellowmouth. They are different animals in different oceans, and a British angler reading `barracuda` on a Lanzarote page is usually picturing the wrong one.
It is a long, silver, torpedo-shaped predator with a jutting lower jaw and two rows of long canine teeth, marked on the upper half of the flank with a row of short dark bars that fade below the lateral line. FishBase records a maximum of 128 cm and 8.2 kg, and it lives from the surface down to about 100 m over reef, drop-off and wreck, usually in numbers rather than alone.
Telling it from its relatives is genuinely difficult, and FishBase says so plainly: its exact distribution and abundance are unknown because most published records do not separate it from *Sphyraena sphyraena*, the European barracuda. In practice, in Canary and Madeiran water, a barracuda in a shoal over shallow rock is this one.
For an angler it is a lure fish. It hunts by sight in clear water and takes fast metal, hard plugs and live bait fished around harbour mouths, breakwaters and clean water with current in it — which is what makes it a genuine shore target on islands where most of the big fishing is a boat ride away. FishBase records it as harmless to humans and as a gamefish, and the rod-caught record for the species was taken off Lanzarote.
How it is caught
Where Yellowmouth barracuda is documented
Places where public sources describe this species as fished, with how it is fished and how strongly the evidence supports it. This is not a range map and it is not a recommendation — it is what has been written down about a fishery rather than a record of any individual catch, and being listed is never permission to fish.
Lanzarote
1 documented place
Arrieta and the Jameos coast
Rock platform
Repeatedly reported
From the shore
What these strengths mean
- Repeatedly reported
- Several independent public accounts. Enough to say it happens more than once; not enough to call it a fishery.
Identification
No photograph of Yellowmouth barracuda 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
- Sphyraena viridensis
- Family
- Sphyraenidae
- Water
- Saltwater
- Conservation status
- Least Concern
- Regions
- Western Europe, West Africa, Mediterranean
- Long, slender, almost cylindrical body with a conical snout and a lower jaw that projects beyond the upper.
- Two rows of long canine-like teeth, and no scales on the preoperculum.
- A series of short dark vertical bars on the upper half of the body, extending below the lateral line only at the front of the flank.
- Usually met in shoals over rock, drop-offs and wrecks rather than singly, which separates it in practice from the solitary great barracuda.
- Separating it from the European barracuda, Sphyraena sphyraena, is difficult enough that FishBase says most published records do not do it.
Size
- Typical
- 1–3 kg (2.2–6.6 lb)
- Large
- 4–7 kg (9–15 lb)
Exceptional: FishBase records a maximum of 128 cm and 8.2 kg
Lifecycle and reproduction
Pelagic-neritic over a depth range of 0 to 100 m, holding to reef edge, drop-offs and structure in clear water rather than ranging across open ocean. FishBase gives it low resilience, which for a shoaling predator taken commercially as well as on rod matters more than its abundance suggests.
Not separately documented: FishBase records that its habits are probably similar to those of the closely related Sphyraena sphyraena, and the confusion between the two in the published record is exactly why its own biology is thin. That is stated here rather than filled in from the other species.
Feeding and senses
Takes cephalopods, crustaceans and fish. It hunts as a shoal in midwater and at the surface, driving small fish against structure, which is why a barracuda session so often begins with bait fish showering out of the water beside a breakwater.
A daylight visual hunter in the clear water of the islands, keyed to flash and speed. That is the whole basis of the method: a fast metal jig worked hard outfishes anything presented slowly, and a bait that hangs still is more likely to be taken by something else.
Through the year
Present through the year in the archipelago rather than running seasonally, with the fishing described as best in the warmer months and around dusk. Several Canary sources describe it as a normal part of night fishing near lit harbour water.
Distribution
Eastern Central Atlantic: Cape Verde and the Canary Islands. Also reported from Lebanon in the eastern Mediterranean. Its exact distribution and abundance are unknown because most published records do not separate it from Sphyraena sphyraena . Also in Azores Islands
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
The pelagic predator a Canary shore angler can realistically reach. It is named by the island authorities among the species of the rock and reef fishing, it takes fast lures from breakwaters and harbour mouths, and it is the fish that makes a spinning rod worth carrying on an island where the marlin and tuna are a charter booking away. Also a spearfishing target on the same ground.
Handling and returning
The teeth are the whole problem. Two rows of long canines in a jaw that keeps working after the fish is landed, on a fish that thrashes. Use long pliers or a T-bar, keep fingers out of the mouth entirely, and control the fish across the body rather than by the head. A wire or heavy fluorocarbon trace is a tackle decision made for the same reason.
Safety
Species that bite — Can cause injury needing treatment
A bite from a barracuda of any size lacerates rather than punctures: the canines are long, backward-raked and set in a jaw built to shear. Injuries happen at the unhooking stage, to a fish that is still fresh, and not in the water.
What reduces it: Unhook with long-nosed pliers or a T-bar disgorger and never with fingers. Pin the fish across the shoulders on a wet surface rather than lifting it by the jaw, cut the trace on a badly hooked fish, and keep bare feet and loose line clear of a fish on the ground.
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 Sphyraena viridensis. FishBase also records that most published records do not separate it from Sphyraena sphyraena.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 Sphyraena viridensis, assessed 14 July 2014.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- REDPROMAR — the Canary Government's marine observation and species network — Gobierno de Canarias, Consejería de Transición Ecológica — REDPROMAR, with GRAFCAN (Conservation authority)Relied on for: That this species is recorded in Canary waters by the regional government's marine observation network, and the Canarian vernacular name it files it under.States this directlyPassage read and verified
- Canary Islands regional angling guidance sites — Various Canary-based angling and island guidance publishers (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Which species Canary shore anglers target from rock, mole and beach, with the techniques and baits the Spanish-language regional guidance describes.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
Why the 5 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.
Great barracuda
Sphyraena viridensis is an eastern Atlantic island and Cape Verde fish that shoals over rock and reef; Sphyraena barracuda is a tropical western Atlantic and Indo-Pacific fish that is usually solitary and grows far larger. Every Canary source saying `barracuda` means the first, and most English-language writing about barracuda means the second.
- 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 — 2 connections
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.
Shore diving
Canary spearfishing material names barracuda among the species taken from shore-entry dives over rock and reef, which is the same ground and the same depth band the rod fishery works.
- Canary Islands regional angling guidance sites — Various Canary-based angling and island guidance publishers (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Canary shore angling practice: the techniques and tackle used from rock, mole and beach, and the species each is used for.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Guías de zonas de pesca en Canarias — Tenerife, Gran Canaria y Lanzarote — GuíaCanarias (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: The techniques named for Canarian fishing — rockfishing, jigging, light bottom fishing and squid jigs — and the species attached to them.States this directlyPassage read and verified
Spinning
The Canary material describes barracuda as taken on fast lures and live bait around harbour mouths, breakwaters and clear water with current. It hunts by sight and speed, so retrieve rate rather than lure choice is what decides the session.
- Canary Islands regional angling guidance sites — Various Canary-based angling and island guidance publishers (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: Canary shore angling practice: the techniques and tackle used from rock, mole and beach, and the species each is used for.States this directlyCitation checked — the work exists and is described correctly
- Guías de zonas de pesca en Canarias — Tenerife, Gran Canaria y Lanzarote — GuíaCanarias (Credible secondary source)Relied on for: The techniques named for Canarian fishing — rockfishing, jigging, light bottom fishing and squid jigs — and the species attached to them.States this directlyPassage read and verified
Where it lives
Backed by research — 2 connections
Supported by peer-reviewed research or fisheries science. The sources are listed and can be checked.
Harbours, piers and breakwaters
A shoaling neritic predator with a depth range beginning at the surface, hunting small fish against hard edges. That combination is what makes a harbour mouth and a breakwater a mark for it rather than merely water it passes through.
- 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 Sphyraena viridensis.States this directlyPassage read and verified
Rocky shores and reefs
Recorded as pelagic-neritic from the surface to 100 m, which is the shelf water over and beside hard ground rather than the open ocean. The Canary sources that name it place it on rock and reef.
- 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 Sphyraena viridensis.States this directlyPassage read and verified
How FishingHQ labels evidence is explained in the evidence policy.