Silver scabbardfish fishing: the fish that chases the Moon

October 3, 2026

On the coast near Moeraki in Otago, New Zealand, some winters left whole shoals of silver ribbons lying on the sand. The Māori called the fish pāra and ate it when it washed ashore; according to English Wikipedia, it was mostly not fished for deliberately. They believed the fish stranded because they were chasing the Moon — early European settlers, on the other hand, thought they chose death of their own free will. English Wikipedia considers a more sober explanation likely: currents catch the fish when they move closer to the coast to spawn. This article is about the silver scabbardfish, *Lepidopus caudatus* — German Strumpfbandfisch or Degenfisch, Italian pesce sciabola, Spanish pez cinto, French sabre argenté, Portuguese peixe-espada-branco.

The fish that rises at night

The Māori weren’t entirely wrong: the silver scabbardfish is a fish of the night. According to German Wikipedia, it stays between 250 and 750 metres during the day and migrates up to 50 metres at night; FishBase puts it briefly: it moves into midwater at night. And according to German Wikipedia, it hunts mainly at night and in the early morning hours. FishBase adds that it occasionally turns up close to the coast — where deep water wells up, it even comes to the surface. So the sand of Moeraki is where a journey ends that the fish makes part of every night.

A scale-foot without scales

It was described in 1788 by the Swedish naturalist Bengt Anders Euphrasén, a student of Linnaeus, as *Trichiurus caudatus* (German, French and Portuguese Wikipedia). According to FishBase and Portuguese Wikipedia, the genus name *Lepidopus* comes from Greek: lepis, scale, and pous, foot — of all things for a fish whose body, according to German, Italian, Swedish and Russian Wikipedia, is completely scaleless. The sources don’t explain the name; the obvious connection is to the tiny, atrophied pelvic fins. The species epithet *caudatus* means “tailed” and, according to Portuguese Wikipedia, refers to the long tail. German Wikipedia counts eleven synonyms, from *Lepidopus argenteus* to *Ziphotheca tetradens*. And one more detail for the fish market: its skin is damaged so easily, Italian Wikipedia writes, that the fish often looks badly stored even though it is fresh.

How to recognise it

FishBase describes an eel-shaped, laterally compressed body; German Wikipedia calls it “very strongly ribbon-like and elongated”. The dorsal fin runs from head to tail and has 98 to 110 soft rays; the anal fin has 2 spines and 59 to 66 soft rays, and according to FishBase the second spine is plate-shaped. The pelvic fins are very small, little more than rudimentary; the caudal fin is small, clearly set off and forked. According to German Wikipedia, the head makes up around 12 percent of body length, the eyes are large — as in many deep-water fish —, the mouth points obliquely upwards, and the lower jaw is slightly longer than the upper jaw. Italian Wikipedia describes the teeth as long, very sharp and cutting; Russian Wikipedia counts 4 to 6 large fangs in the upper jaw and 1 to 2 in the lower jaw. According to FishBase, it is uniformly silver. In fish from the North Atlantic and the Mediterranean, the dorsal fin is blackish grey throughout, according to German Wikipedia; fish from the Southern Hemisphere, according to German Wikipedia, carry a black spot in the front part of the caudal fin — Portuguese Wikipedia moves the mark to the dorsal fin, as a black edge between the 3rd and the 7th to 9th ray.

Size: FishBase gives 210 cm total length as the maximum and 117 cm (standard length) as common; the heaviest published weight is 8 kg, the greatest age 8 years. According to FishBase, it reaches sexual maturity at around 111 cm.

Where it lives and what it eats

Distribution: according to FishBase, in the Eastern Atlantic from France and the western Mediterranean to Senegal, including the Azores, Madeira, Canaries and the seamounts off them; in the south from Namibia to the Agulhas Bank in South Africa, on seamounts in the southern Indian Ocean, off Australia and New Zealand and off Peru. A record from Mexico is considered doubtful.
Depth: FishBase gives 42 to 620 metres, usually 100 to 300. It lives on the continental shelf, at its edge and on the upper slope down to 400 metres, mostly over sand and mud bottoms at 100 to 250 metres. In the eastern Ionian Sea, according to FishBase, it was found at 333 to 620 metres.
Season and size: In summer, according to German Wikipedia, it stays deeper than in winter, and larger, heavier fish keep shallower than small ones.
Shoals: FishBase and German Wikipedia describe it as a shoaling fish; Finnish Wikipedia speaks of shoals of more than 10 000 individuals, Russian Wikipedia of very fast swimmers.
Diet: crustaceans, small squid and fish (FishBase) — according to German Wikipedia, mainly krill (euphausiids), decapods and small fish such as *Lampanyctodes hectoris* or the silvery pout *Gadiculus argenteus*, occasionally smaller members of its own species. Juveniles mainly eat crustaceans, large fish mainly eat fish, and they hunt more freely in open water, while the small ones forage closer to the bottom. FishBase places it at trophic level 3.8.
Predators: other predatory fish, sharks and rays, as well as large cephalopods (German Wikipedia); Italian Wikipedia names hake, dolphinfish, conger eel, swordfish, sharks, rays and sea lions.

Spawning above the shelf edge

The sexes are separate. According to German Wikipedia, the fish reach sexual maturity at 1.5 to 2 years; Italian Wikipedia gives 97 cm for males and 111 cm for females, both at around two years. According to German Wikipedia, spawning takes place all year round, most markedly between spring and autumn, and shallower than 50 metres above the edge of the continental shelf or in open water. The eggs drift in the plankton, measure 1.7 mm on average and are slightly pink; Italian Wikipedia gives 1.6 mm and a pink oil droplet that keeps them afloat. After about six days, a larva of around 5 mm hatches, with a spine-like process behind the head. The juveniles grow fastest in the first two to four years; the males grow slightly faster and mature earlier (German Wikipedia), while the females, according to Italian Wikipedia, grow larger and probably live longer.

How it is caught — and what you should know

FishBase classifies it as “highly commercial” and explicitly lists it as a game fish as well. According to German Wikipedia, it is caught from vessels with bottom trawls, gillnets and longlines; targeted fisheries use modified longlines whose rear end is reinforced with metal. Longlines catch considerably more in summer than in winter and larger fish than nets do. In the northwestern Mediterranean, according to German Wikipedia, it has been targeted since the mid-1980s. Italian Wikipedia names longlines and purse seines with light sources, Spanish Wikipedia, for the Mediterranean, trawl and longline. In angling, according to Dutch Wikipedia, it is rarely pursued.

⚠️ What follows is a conclusion drawn from its biology, not a sourced statement: a fish that rises at night, hunts at night and in the early morning, can be drawn together with light, and whose teeth force commercial fishers to use metal-reinforced lines is a fish for the night, for light over deep water at the shelf edge — and for a bite-proof leader.

Two warnings. Italian Wikipedia writes that the fish is very frequently infested with the nematode Anisakis; the flesh must therefore be thoroughly cooked. And the teeth: long, sharp and cutting — keep your distance when unhooking. The flesh itself, according to Italian Wikipedia, is considered excellent, delicate and low in bones.

And the stock? According to German Wikipedia, reported catches worldwide rose to 27 000 tonnes a year by 1993 and fell to 9 000 tonnes by 2010; the largest quantities were reported by Portugal (2 966 t) and New Zealand (2 638 t). The IUCN lists the species as “Data Deficient” — there is not enough data for an assessment (FishBase: assessed on 19 May 2013). FishBase rates its vulnerability to fishing as “moderate to high” (53 out of 100) and its resilience as medium; a stock needs 1.4 to 4.4 years to double. Italian Wikipedia sees a slight decline in some areas, but thanks to fast growth and early maturity a high capacity for recovery. Minimum sizes, catch limits and closed seasons are set by each country — check them locally.

Five contradictions, left open

How big and how heavy? FishBase: at most 210 cm, commonly 117 cm, 8 kg. Spanish Wikipedia writes that it measures “on average” around 205 cm — and right after that, that the Northeast Atlantic variant measures 100 to 135 cm at 1 to 2.3 kg. Portuguese: on average 1 to 1.35 m. Finnish: mostly 67 to 117 cm. Italian: average over one metre. German: over two metres and around eight kilos — though it is assumed that even larger ones exist.
How old? FishBase, Italian and French Wikipedia: 8 years. German: up to 13 years. Portuguese: fish from the Northeast Atlantic reach 1.60 m at 13 years, those from the Eastern Atlantic around 1.25 m at nine years.
How deep? FishBase: 42 to 620 m, commonly 100 to 300. German Wikipedia: 250 to 750 m during the day — deeper than FishBase knows at all. Italian and Swedish: 40 to over 600 m. Dutch and Finnish: 100 to 600 m. Russian: 100 to 250 m, in the north down to 400 m. Portuguese: from the surface to 400 m.
When does it spawn? German Wikipedia: all year round, especially spring to autumn. Italian: year-round with a peak in the warm season. Finnish: in the Mediterranean April to October. Swedish: off North Africa late winter to spring, off New Zealand spring to autumn. Russian: late winter, early spring. And English Wikipedia links the winter strandings to the spawning migration.
Where — and is it even one species? FishBase: Eastern Atlantic from France, Mediterranean only in the west — and yet a record from the eastern Ionian Sea. Italian Wikipedia has it starting from Norway, Finnish from Iceland; Swedish knows of a single record from Bohuslän, 1935. Russian mentions tropical waters, Italian says it disappears in the equatorial region. And German Wikipedia reports that fish from the North Atlantic and from New Zealand differ genetically by 2.75 percent — six times more than within the stocks. Perhaps they are two species; Finnish Wikipedia also considers this possible for the Australian and New Zealand fish. It has not been settled.

Six names that lead to the wrong fish

“Degenfisch” and “peixe-espada”. In Portugal it is called peixe-espada-branco, the white one — to distinguish it from the peixe-espada-preto, the black scabbardfish *Aphanopus carbo* (Portuguese Wikipedia). According to English Wikipedia, that one lives in the Atlantic at 180 to 1 700 metres and is a different fish. And the espadarte is the swordfish, which has its own article in this series.
“Pesce sciabola”, “sable”, “beltfish”. These names are also used for the hairtail *Trichiurus lepturus* — English Wikipedia calls it largehead hairtail or beltfish, Italian Wikipedia pesce coltello. The English GBIF list also gives “Beltfish”, “Cutlassfish” and “Ribbonfish” for *Lepidopus*, the Spanish one “Sable”. *Lepidopus* can be recognised by its forked caudal fin; the name *Trichiurus* means “hair tail”.
“Spada”, “Spadon”, “morski meč”. Sword names: Italian “spada”, Greek “Spadon”, Slovenian “morski meč” (sea sword), Serbian “Sablja”, Russian “сабля-рыба”. It has nothing to do with the swordfish *Xiphias gladius*.
“Garter” and “scabbard”. German Strumpfbandfisch, Dutch kousenbandvis, Swedish strumpebandsfisk, Danish strømpebåndsfisk — everywhere the garter, the silver band. Norwegian, on the other hand, calls it slirefisk, the “sheath fish” — like the English scabbard, the sword sheath.
GBIF oddities. The GBIF name list for *Lepidopus caudatus* also includes “Pesce san pietro” (that is the John Dory, a separate group in this series), “Ryba-lotsman” (the pilot fish), “Sable Negro” (which fits the black *Aphanopus*) and “Argentina” — a name also borne by the argentines of the genus *Argentina*. And Portuguese Wikipedia lists among its prey in the Eastern Atlantic, of all things, the pike *Esox lucius* — a freshwater fish. Entries like these are errors, not names.
Japanese. Wikidata writes オビレタチ (obiretachi), GBIF オビレダチ (obiredachi) — the same name, two spellings. The タチウオ (tachiuo) on Japanese markets is, according to Japanese Wikipedia, *Trichiurus lepturus* — not this fish. And in New Zealand, according to English Wikipedia, it is called frostfish, by the Māori pāra.

That leaves the question every article in this series starts with: when. Depth, diet and night migration are covered above, and they are fixed. What changes every day is everything else — and that is exactly where it is decided whether a night on the water is worth it. That is what StrikeAhead calculates: it takes the conditions on your water and tells you when the trip is worth it. And because you don’t look for a fish from 300 metres down from the shore, StrikeAhead Pathfinder tells you who to go out with: curated guides and skippers, personally vetted before listing — licence and insurance —, with verified catches instead of promo photos, no paid ranking and, for you as an angler, no booking fee.

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