Rainbow trout
Amazing fact
Rainbow trout use their keen eyesight to detect prey.
University of Michigan Animal Diversity Web
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An illustration based on the real animal.
A little discovery to share.
Rainbow trout use their keen eyesight to detect prey.
THE REAL WORLD
The real Rainbow trout
- Scientific name
- Oncorhynchus mykiss
- Japanese name
- ニジマス
- Group
- Freshwater animals
- Order
- Salmoniformes
- Family
- Salmonidae
- Genus
- Oncorhynchus
Those that go down to the sea to grow are called steelhead.
A member of the salmon family whose original home is the Pacific coast of North America and the Kamchatka Peninsula.
It has a silvery belly and a pinkish-red stripe along its side; the stripe can be darker or lighter.
Those that go to sea to grow return to the river where they were born to lay eggs, and some go back to the sea afterwards.
How the Rainbow trout lives
They mainly eat invertebrate larvae drifting in the water. In upper streams, they sometimes live alongside char. They dig holes in gravel beds to lay their eggs.
University of Michigan Animal Diversity Web国立環境研究所 侵入生物データベース水産研究・教育機構Basic data
- Size
- up to 120 cmUniversity of Michigan Animal Diversity Web
- Weight
- up to 25.4 kg, average 4 kgUniversity of Michigan Animal Diversity Web
- Lifespan
- up to 11 years in the wild, 6–8 years in the wildUniversity of Michigan Animal Diversity Web
- Diet
- Terrestrial and aquatic insects, amphipods and other invertebrates, and small fish国立環境研究所 侵入生物データベース
- Range
- Kamchatka Peninsula and the Pacific coast from Alaska to Baja California国立環境研究所 侵入生物データベース
Where the Rainbow trout 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
- ニジマス
- 简体中文
- 虹鳟
- 繁體中文
- 麥奇鉤吻鮭
- 한국어
- 무지개송어
- Español
- Trucha arcoíris
- Français
- Truite arc-en-ciel
- Deutsch
- Regenbogenforelle
- Português (Brasil)
- Truta-arco-íris
- Italiano
- Trota iridea
- العربية
- سلمون قوس قزح
- Bahasa Indonesia
- Trout pelangi
- Tiếng Việt
- Cá hồi vân
- Русский
- Микижа
- Türkçe
- Gökkuşağı alabalığı
- বাংলা
- রেইনবো ট্রাউট
Names come from Wikidata and iNaturalist records. Where a language has no recorded name, we use the scientific name.
Sources and how we check
- 国立環境研究所 侵入生物データベース — ニジマスChecked: 2026-11-03
- University of Michigan Animal Diversity Web — Oncorhynchus mykissChecked: 2026-11-03
- 水産研究・教育機構 — 日本のサケ科魚類Checked: 2026-11-03
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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