Pyramid butterflyfish
Amazing fact
The pyramid butterflyfish has a white pyramid-shaped patch on the side of its body.
Australian Museum
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An illustration based on the real animal.
A little discovery to share.
The pyramid butterflyfish has a white pyramid-shaped patch on the side of its body.
THE REAL WORLD
The real Pyramid butterflyfish
- Scientific name
- Hemitaurichthys polylepis
- Japanese name
- カスミチョウチョウウオ
- Group
- Ocean animals
- Order
- Chaetodontiformes
- Family
- Chaetodontidae
- Genus
- Hemitaurichthys
On steep slopes with strong currents outside coral reefs, it sometimes forms very large schools.
Its Japanese name, "haze butterflyfish", is said to come from its schools, so big that the water looks hazy.
How the Pyramid butterflyfish lives
It eats plankton while swimming high above the seabed.
Australian MuseumBasic data
- Range
- Pacific Ocean
Where the Pyramid butterflyfish has been recorded
Records: GBIF.org (CC0 and CC BY 4.0 records, retrieved 2026-11-07). Map: Natural EarthSee the records on GBIF
Watch wild animals from a distance. Do not touch or feed them, and take care of the places where they live.
Names around the world
- 日本語
- カスミチョウチョウウオ
- 简体中文
- 多鳞霞蝶鱼
- 繁體中文
- 多鱗霞蝶魚
- Español
- Pez mariposa pirámide
- Français
- Poisson-papillon pyramide
- Deutsch
- Gelber Pyramidenfalterfisch
- Português (Brasil)
- Peixe-borboleta-pirâmide-amarelo
- Italiano
- Pesce farfalla piramide
- Bahasa Indonesia
- Kepe-kepe segitiga
- Русский
- Осторожный гемитаурихт
Names come from Wikidata and iNaturalist records. Where a language has no recorded name, we use the scientific name.
Sources and how we check
- 鳥羽水族館 — カスミチョウチョウウオChecked: 2026-11-04
- Australian Museum — Pyramid Butterflyfish, Hemitaurichthys polylepis (Bleeker, 1857)Checked: 2026-11-07
We check each fact against its source. The illustrations simplify how the real animal looks.
The classification (class, order, family, genus) follows Wikidata records, checked against GBIF. Classifications can change as research goes on.
The basic data are the values given in each source. They vary with how the animal is measured, whether it is male or female, and whether it lives in the wild or in captivity.
This page was translated from the original Japanese with the help of AI.
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