starry flounders
platichthys latin

Platichthys is a genus of righteye flounders, known as the Starry flounders, native to the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

Starry flounders are inshore fish, ranging up estuaries well into the freshwater zone, to the first riffles, with young found as much as 120 km inland.

Like all flounders, when young starry flounders swim around like normal fish, vertically, but soon they begin to tilt to a side as they swim and eventually live lying on the sandy floor.

Predators include the seastar Pisaster brevispinus and the starry flounder Platichthys stellatus as well as crabs and sea gulls.

Male Platichthys are known to display a pioneering spirit, and have been found up to 80 miles off the coast of northern Sardinia, sometimes with heavy encrustations of various species of Barnacle.