What Divers Should Know About Grouper

Their powerful mouths and gills allow groupers to create a strong vacuum, pulling prey like fish, octopuses, and crustaceans in from a distance. Some species are ambush predators, while others actively hunt, consuming their prey whole with the aid of heavy crushing tooth plates inside the pharynx. Notably, groupers are one of the only animals known to eat invasive red lionfish. These stout-bodied fish are not built for long-distance, fast swimming.

Groupers encompass a diverse family (Epinephelidae), many of which can be quite large, with some individuals exceeding a meter in length. The Atlantic goliath grouper stands out as the largest, reaching up to 2.43 meters and weighing 399 kilograms. Their unique mouth structure is also employed to dig shelters under large rocks, jetting sand out through their gills. Intriguingly, some roving coralgroupers have been observed cooperating with giant morays during hunting.