{"id":931,"date":"2020-08-01T22:21:31","date_gmt":"2020-08-01T21:21:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/animal\/mullet\/"},"modified":"2025-09-18T10:23:48","modified_gmt":"2025-09-18T10:23:48","slug":"mullet","status":"publish","type":"animal","link":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/discover\/animals\/mullet\/","title":{"rendered":"Mullet"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Did you know?<\/h2>\n
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Nothing to do with the 80s haircut that\u2019s come back into style lately, mullets are a family of fish that have been living in the ocean for thousands of years!<\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/section>\n\n\n

These scaley swimmers aren\u2019t exactly hard to find \u2013 but they are hard to catch. We prefer to keep ours off the hook, which is why you\u2019ll find them right at home in our exhibits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ready to learn more about the mullet, including what it looks like, what it likes to chomp on and where in the world they live? Let\u2019s take a look at the fishy family in more detail below.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Appearance<\/h2>\n
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What does a mullet fish look like?<\/h4>\n
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With their long bodies and small triangular mouths, mullets are pretty distinctive-looking guys. There\u2019s also officially three of them in the family, each with their own appearance.<\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/section>\n\n\n

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Habitat<\/h2>\n
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Since they\u2019re mostly a European species, mullets tend to be found in the waters all across the entire continent. They\u2019re very common in the Mediterranean Sea, have a presence in the Black Sea and can also be found along the Atlantic coast of Spain, France and Portugal. Further north where it\u2019s colder, they also live in the f-f-f-freezing Icelandic and Nordic waters of the Baltic Sea, but they\u2019ve also been known to call the African coast of Senegal and Gambia their home too.<\/p>\n

As for over here in the UK, mullets can be found all over the British Isles, but they tend to prefer the south and west over the north.<\/p>\n

Wherever they are, mullets like calm, still waters \u2013 the kinds you\u2019d find in harbours, marinas (where they love to swim between moored boats), natural coves and bays. When it\u2019s still enough, they can sometimes be seen swimming just below the surface of the sea in small groups too! They don\u2019t mind salty or stagnant water either, and will swim in rivers that are very far inland as well.<\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n

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Diet<\/h2>\n
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Mullets have a pretty strange diet, feeding mainly on organic matter from the seabed. Here, they\u2019ll scoop seabed sediment and mud into their mouths like a spade, consuming things like plankton, algae and vegetation, and then filtering out any nasty, inedible items through their gills.<\/p>\n

However, they\u2019ve also been known to nibble on worms that have come loose from the seabed, as well as small pieces of dead fish, and any other animal matter that they might find on the seabed.<\/p>\n

Mullet don\u2019t tend to be found on the plates of many households in the UK, although some people enjoy eating them. However, any mullet swimming in polluted waters is not safe to eat at all! As you can imagine though, their small size does make them easy targets for bigger fish! It\u2019s not just other fish that dine on them either, eagles, hawks and herons also like to make a meal of them too.<\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/section>\n\n\n

Thick lipped grey mullet fish<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The biggest and most common of the mullet species, the thick lipped grey can be identified by its silver scales on its back sides, which become whiter on their underside. The scales are bigger around its head and gills too. They aren\u2019t very heavy either, usually weighing somewhere in the region of 1-2kg, although the heaviest one on record reached a weight of 6.4kg!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thin lipped grey mullet fish<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

A mullet fish without the plastic surgery? Not quite! While the thin lipped grey mullet has a smaller mouth than its lippy relative, there are other things that distinguish the thin lipped mullet too. They\u2019re lighter in colour, sometimes with a bluish tint, while the lines that run along their bodies are also much lighter. Sometimes they also have a dark spot at the base of their side (or pectoral) fin too. They\u2019re lighter than the thick-lipped variety too, with the record heaviest mullet weighing only 3.6kg.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Golden grey mullet<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The smallest of the official mullet species, the golden grey mullet is also the rarest! Appearance-wise, they\u2019re pretty similar to the two above, although the golden mark above each gill cover does make it look rather special in our opinion. Their side fins are also the longest \u2013 if they fold them forward, they can nearly cover their eyes with them! The lightest in the family too, the golden grey\u2019s record weight was only 1.7kg.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Why do mullet fish jump out of water?<\/h4>\n
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This isn\u2019t the beginning of a bad joke, we promise! Mullets are sometimes called the \u201chappy\u201d or \u201cjumping\u201d mullet because it looks like they\u2019re skipping along the surface of the water. This is apparently to increase the amount of oxygen in the mullet\u2019s body \u2013 when they\u2019re in water that has lower levels of oxygen, you\u2019ll see them jumping more often!<\/p>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/section>\n\n\n

Where can you find mullets at Deep Sea World?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Want to see mullets for yourself? We thought so! We\u2019ve got them in our Scottish Seas and Rockpools<\/a> exhibit, along with a load of other fishy friends for you to explore. We\u2019ll see you there!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Fun facts about mullets<\/h2>\n
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What else is there to know about mullets? How about these little tidbits below?<\/p>\n

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  • The mullet can live up to 13 years, though 5 to 7 is generally the average age<\/li>\n
  • Since they feed from the ocean floor, they\u2019re known as \u201cbottom feeders\u201d<\/li>\n
  • Its teeth are very small and are arranged in several rows<\/li>\n
  • Mullets don\u2019t have what\u2019s known as a lateral line \u2013 the organ that detects changes in the movement of water currents<\/li>\n
  • Scientists discovered that mullets move the top portion of their bodies back and forth to communicate with their pals. How cool is that?<\/li>\n
  • Despite being prey for several other species, they aren\u2019t afraid to defend themselves with their sharp teeth!<\/li>\n
  • Anglers and fishermen have nicknamed them the grey ghost. This is because they\u2019re extremely hard to catch, avoiding noise and even ignoring bait that\u2019s placed right in from of them!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n <\/section>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    These scaley swimmers aren\u2019t exactly hard to find \u2013 but they are hard to catch. We prefer to keep ours off the hook, which is why you\u2019ll find them right at home in our exhibits. Ready to learn more about the mullet, including what it looks like, what it likes to chomp on and where […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":932,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":true},"animal_type":[6],"class_list":["post-931","animal","type-animal","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","animal_type-fish"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/animal\/931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/animal"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/animal"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/932"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"animal_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/neuronicdev.es\/deep-sea-world\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/animal_type?post=931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}