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Cozumel · National Marine Park
Cozumel marine life
Turtles, eagle rays, and one fish that lives here and nowhere else on earth.
Endemic
The splendid toadfish
It lives on this island's reefs and nowhere else in the world. Look under ledges for a striped face, barbels around the mouth and brilliant yellow fin margins. The males sing — a low, foghorn call you can hear on the reef.
Regulars
What you'll see
Turtles
Green and hawksbill turtles are common on most sites, often with angelfish in attendance.
Groupers
Black and Nassau groupers hold station in the shadows of the big structures at Palancar and Columbia.
Southern stingrays
Half-buried in sand or seagrass. Paradise and Paso del Cedral are the best bets.
Sharks
Nurse sharks rest under ledges by day, especially at Paso del Cedral. Reef sharks are rarer, on the deeper southern walls at Columbia and Punta Sur.
Schooling fish
Grunts, snappers and creole wrasse mass over the shallow reefs. Paso del Cedral is wall-to-wall fish.
Balloonfish
Hovering just above the seagrass on the shallow sites.
Eagle rays pass out in the blue, most often at Columbia Deep. In the cooler months they sometimes come through in squadrons — see when to dive.
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