Cunner | DE L'EAU À LA BOUCHE

Illustration couleur d'une tanche tautogue.

Corps allongé, tête pointue et une large queue ovale.

De couleur variable selon la nature du fond sur lequel elle évolue. Elle peut être brune, bleue, verte ou rouge. Le ventre est dans les tons de bleuâtre à blanc. Les jeunes tanches-tautogues ont généralement une tache noire sur la nageoire dorsale.

Petite bouche caractéristique portant plusieurs rangées de dents inégales et coniques. La tanche-tautogue a de grosses lèvres qui peuvent parfois être jaunes.

Son dos porte une longue nageoire ininterrompue.

Son corps est couvert de grandes écailles rugueuses.

Nom

Cunner
Tautogolabrus adspersus

Type

Bottom fish

Autres appellations

Nom en cuisine

État de la ressource

Not a cause for concern

Saison de consommation

Not yet commercialised.

SIZE :

30 cm, up to 44 cm.

LIFE EXPECTANCY :

10 years.

LIFE CYCLE :

Sexual maturity is attained around the age of three.

Spawning takes place from June to mid-August in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.

Males develop a nuptial coloration, which is more pronounced, at the end of winter. They define a territory and defend it fiercely against other suitors. This is where the courtship of the female takes place. Males and females release their sperm and eggs into the water, swimming very close together. Fertilisation takes place externally. Fish of both sexes can mate more than once a day.

The eggs float to the surface and hatch 2 or 3 days later.

Photographie couleur d'un banc de tanche-tautogues.

Young cunner generally have a black spot on their dorsal fin.
Credit : Richard Larocque, photo taken in the Magdalen Islands, at a depth of 10 metres.

Voir l’image en plein écran

Close to the bottom, 10 to 130 m deep, in salt water.

The cunner is a sedentary fish that lives in coastal waters. They live on or near the seafloor, in beds of seagrass and rocks, around wharves and shipwrecks, for example.

Hibernation

To survive the winter, the cunner goes into dormancy. When the water temperature drops below 5 °C, it is not uncommon to find cunner in a state of lethargy, under rocks or in crevices. They can stop feeding for up to six months.

PREY :

Molluscs
Crustaceans
Urchins
Fish eggs

PREDATORS :

Sculpins
Seabirds

MACHINES :

No commercial fishing. Recreational angling.

In the beginning

Its French name, tanche-tautogue, is borrowed from the Narragansett language of the Nahahiganseck Sovereign Nation, an Algonquin people from Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut in the United States. Today, the word “tautog” refers to the Black tautog, a fish closely related to the cunner.

LET’S COOK :

Be careful when eating. This fish has many bones.