Another song to help identify different species of snapper…

“We Love Our Snappers!”

(To be sung to the tune of “Can’t take my eyes off you”)

When you are learning your fish,
Can’t give your snappers a miss,
Continuous dorsal fin,
Often higher where they begin,
With slightly upturned snouts,
And downturned mouths
This makes them look quite sad,
But they’ve teeth that make them look bad

The Bluelined has four lines,
A yellow body that’s streamlined,
But don’t get too bemused,
The Bluestripe’s easy to confuse,
Count the lines; Stripey’s got six,
So don’t get in a fix

Now we don’t have far to go,
There are only seven to know,
Bluelined, Bluestriped, Black and it’s juvenile Twinspot, one spot, black spot and big eye, Bluelined, Bluestriped, Black and Big Eye, Twin, One and Black Spoooooooot!

We know our snappers,
Because they’re medium sized,
We know our snappers
They are nektonic guys

We know our snappers,
And their emarginate tails
We know our snappers,
With their continuous fin,

We know our snappers
They eat other fish,
They are oblong fishes with triangular heads…

Silver, reddish or yellow,
The One Spot’s a lonely fellow,
Twin Spot has two light spots,
Located near to his top,
Browney yellow in colour,
He’s a little bit duller,
As is his brother the black,
But the juvenile’s all that,

Silver with yellow brown stripe,
The Big Eye is a nice type,
Of fish to have for tea,
As is the whole family,
The blackspot has just one spot,
And a yellowey bot,
He also has stripes,
And hunts in the night,
Bluelined, Bluestriped, Black and it’s juvenile Twinspot, one spot, black spot and big eye Bluelined, Bluestriped, Black and Big Eye, Twin, One and Black Spoooooooot!

We love our snappers,
And if it’s quite alright,
We’ll eat our snappers,
For dinner every night,
We thank our snappers,
For be-ing just so yum-my!

By Tori Jordan and Vic Nott

Posted by Blue Ventures

Blue Ventures is an award winning marine conservation charity. We rebuild tropical fisheries with coastal communities. On our Beyond Conservation blog you can hear voices from the front line of marine conservation written by our staff and volunteers.

2 Comments

  1. Excellent job! Though I lost the rhythm somewhere . . .

    I wonder if different colored snappers have different personalities???

    Reply

  2. Lol, I wouldnt be surprised if red snappers all had fiery personalities. Perhaps thats why they taste sooo good!

    Reply

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