Panama — Pacific, Canal & Caribbean

Mahi Mahi

Coryphaena hippurus

The fastest-growing fish in the ocean and one of the most colourful. Mahi gather under weed lines and floating debris, travel in schools, and strike trolled baits and cast lures with almost no hesitation.

Yellowfin Tuna

Thunnus albacares

The 'ahi' of Hawaii and the glamour tuna of the Gulf and Baja — a fast, surface-feeding school fish that rewards anglers who read birds, currents and temperature breaks.

Butterfly Peacock Bass

Cichla ocellaris

A South American cichlid deliberately stocked in South Florida canals since 1984 — a legal, managed introduction, not an illegal invasive. It cannot survive water below about 59°F (15°C), which is why it stays in South Florida. A hard-hitting visual predator, it is now a signature Miami canal gamefish.

Bigeye Trevally

Caranx sexfasciatus

A wide-ranging Indo-Pacific trevally that also spans Pacific Mexico and Central America (noted here for its full range). Famous for dense daytime schools over reefs and aggressive feeding at dusk and at night.

Black Marlin

Istiompax indica

The heavyweight Indo-Pacific marlin. Piñas Bay, Panama — home of Tropic Star Lodge and Hannibal Bank — is its Central American stronghold, where Panama practice is catch-and-release on circle hooks.

Pacific Cubera Snapper

Lutjanus novemfasciatus

The largest snapper in the eastern Pacific — a bullish, fang-toothed reef predator also called the Pacific dog snapper. Adults are solitary night hunters over rock and reef; the biggest fish come from Panama and Costa Rica.

Yellow Snapper

Lutjanus argentiventris

A rosy-to-golden Pacific snapper of reefs and mangroves — despite the shared name, it is a completely different species and ocean from the Atlantic yellowtail snapper.

Pacific Crevalle Jack

Caranx caninus

The eastern Pacific sister species of the Atlantic crevalle jack — a schooling, hard-running predator of surf beaches, estuary mouths and nearshore bait schools from Baja to Panama. Revered for its fight rather than its flesh.

White Corvina

Cynoscion albus

The largest Pacific corvina of Central America — a silvery croaker of estuary mouths and surf from southern Mexico to Panama, prized on the table and taken on shrimp, sardines and soft plastics around river mouths in Costa Rica and Panama.

Latin Grunt

Haemulon steindachneri

A sandy-bottom schooling grunt of the eastern Pacific, from the Sea of Cortez to Peru. Since 2020 the Atlantic population has been treated as a separate species, Haemulon atlanticus — this is the true Pacific fish.

Black Skipjack

Euthynnus lineatus

The eastern Pacific's small tuna, forming mixed schools with yellowfin and skipjack over warm coastal and offshore surface water. It is a fast, opportunistic predator and a lively light-tackle and bait-boat fish.

Sergeant Major

Abudefduf saxatilis

The Atlantic's bold little striped damselfish, in yellow-green with five black bars, swarming over shallow reef tops and around piers. Taxonomy matters here: FishBase is explicit that Abudefduf saxatilis is strictly Atlantic — the look-alike Pacific fish is a separate species, Abudefduf troschelii, so no Pacific distribution is claimed on this page.

Scalyfin Corvina

Cynoscion squamipinnis

A small eastern Pacific corvina called corvina aguada in Costa Rica, common in shallow coastal water and estuaries from the Gulf of California to Peru and a staple of the Gulf of Nicoya artisanal fishery.

Redtail Parrotfish

Sparisoma chrysopterum

A common Caribbean parrotfish that grazes algae from reef and rock, keeping reef surfaces open for coral — an encounter species best admired and released, as parrotfish are discouraged as food in many places for their grazing role.

Yellowtail Parrotfish

Sparisoma rubripinne

A widespread Caribbean parrotfish — yellow-tailed as a juvenile/initial-phase fish and red-finned as a terminal male — that grazes algae off reefs and is best released to keep reefs clean for coral.