Many people have only encountered fish referred to as “snapper” on seafood menus or perhaps fishing a reef offshore. If you’ve read our other Fish Facts, then you already know our estuaries on the Georgia coast are full of surprises, and this fish is just that! The Mangrove snapper (Lutjanus griseus), or gray snapper, is a species of snapper that can be found in the estuarine waters of the southeast United States, with a full range from Massachusetts to Brazil and the Gulf of Mexico. In the juvenile stage, this fish can exhibit a blue line underneath the eye that can make it easy to identify. The rest of the body is grayish and olive colored, with the vertical bars seen in this picture fading as the fish ages. At maturity, mangrove snappers can be over a foot long and weigh up to 8 pounds. The specimens we usually encounter in our monthly trawls, though, are far smaller and still considered juveniles.

Despite their name, mangrove snapper can be found in multiple habitats besides mangroves, which ironically have recently begun showing up in coastal Georgia. Locally, they like to live around structures such as docks, soft corals, or even floating debris. The young stick to protected inshore waters and move into deeper offshore waters as they mature into adults. Their sharp teeth help them feed on small fishes, crustaceans, and other invertebrates like aquatic snails and worms. These snappers spawn, or reproduce, in the summer, so seeing juvenile mangrove snappers in our waters during fall is fairly common.

Fun Fact: Mangrove snappers have a distinct “arrow” or “anchor” tooth patch pattern on the roof of their mouth. This characteristic can be used to distinguish it from similar looking snapper species.