River Cardinalfish: Facts & Habitat

About River Cardinalfish

The river cardinalfish is an Indo-Pacific fish that uses mangrove estuaries, tidal creeks and lower river reaches. Its scientific name appears as both Apogon hyalosoma and Yarica hyalosoma.

IntroducedFresh Salt Brackish

Range and natural history

Adults commonly inhabit brackish water or fresh water near river mouths and are active at night. Their tolerance of different salinities links the lower river with the estuarine mangrove habitat. This is a different setting from a cardinalfish confined to an offshore reef.

Museum-backed Fishes of Australia and Japan’s JAMSTEC database connect the two genus combinations. The name river cardinalfish should be checked against that identity, since common names such as mangrove or humpbacked cardinalfish are also used.

Sources: Yarica hyalosoma species summary; Taxonomy and name history

Guide sources

Research reviewed 2026-10-19.

Yarica hyalosoma species summary — FishBase
Taxonomy and name history — JAMSTEC

Range

Where it lives

GBIF holds no US occurrence record for this species under this name. That is a gap in the record, not evidence that the fish is absent: ITIS files it as a US species.

Habitat