Cairns Marine

15/08/2026

Somebody asked if we had anthias… yep, we’ve got anthias! 👀🐠

Just a quick snippet tonight of some absolutely cracking anthias fresh in from the Clearwater Coral Sea trip. The boat unloaded yesterday and the team has been flat out getting everything settled, processed and looking its best.

I’d planned to pull together a proper highlights reel today, but there are simply too many awesome fish and I ran out of day before I ran out of fish. Not a bad problem to have!

I’ll get a heap of highlights up tomorrow once everything has had another night to settle. There are some seriously beautiful fish in the facility at the moment, along with plenty of the weird, wonderful and not-so-everyday stuff we love.

Australian hand-caught marine life, collected and cared for by people who know it from reef to aquarium.

Transparent + Traceable + Managed = Sustainable.

14/08/2026

Clearwater is home from the Coral Sea — and what an unload! 🇦🇺🐠
After nearly four months of difficult winter weather, we finally got the Coral Sea weather window we’ve been waiting for — and this morning Clearwater unloaded a fantastic range of fish.
It is seriously good to see our tanks full and busy again! Some very strong weeks of sales had depleted stocks dramatically, and it has been a long time since we’ve seen this sort of diversity coming through the doors at once. There are some absolute crackers amongst them!
This is where Australian hand-caught fish really come into their own. Anthias, butterflies, angels, wrasses, tangs and plenty more — individually hand caught and properly handled from reef to our facility.
Anthias are a great example. They simply don't travel well through long, multi-stage supply chains. Knowing where our fish came from, how they were collected, handled and treated gives our clients the best possible foundation for success.
Known provenance. Known handling. Known treatment. Australian hand-caught quality. 🇦🇺
We know we’ve been saying “get your orders in early” lately, but we genuinely don’t want people disappointed. It has been a long time since anyone has had this sort of diverse Australian stock available and some won't last long.
Stocklists went out today and these new arrivals will start shipping Monday.
We’ll do a quick walk-around on Saturday and show you some of the goodies — there is plenty worth seeing!

Transparent + Traceable + Managed = Sustainable.

13/08/2026

SUPER MARINE NERD REVEAL 👀
If you spotted a fish hiding in plain sight, well played. This week’s answer is the Reef Stonefish — Synanceia verrucosa.
Johannes Steen once again chimed in with precision, although the alternative suggestion of “live rock” may have slightly undermined his position. 😂 Sam Shepard nailed both common and Latin names, but a special shout-out to Harry Foster, who not only got the answer but somehow attached a photo pointing to the exact spot on the Stonefish! Not sure whether there was some AI assistance involved there, Harry, but well played. 👀
Reminder though — no pictures in the guesses! It gives the game away for everyone else.
Tim Kelly also came in with an interesting suggestion. Not one I expected to see, and unfortunately a little wide of the mark this week!
Stonefish take camouflage to another level. Their lumpy skin, broken outline and reef-rubble colours allow them to virtually disappear into the bottom — exactly what made this challenge photo so good.
Then there’s the business end. S. verrucosa carries 13 stout dorsal venom spines. When pressure drives a spine into tissue, the sheath around it is pushed down, compressing the venom apparatus and delivering venom along grooves in the spine into the wound — rather like a mechanically operated syringe. Brilliant biological engineering, and one very good reason not to stand on one.
We supply Reef Stonefish to public aquaria around the world, where they’re always a crowd favourite. Anything that bites, stings, maims or potentially kills tends to get the public’s attention! We also provide them for venom and antivenom research.
So that ugly little “rock” is actually a highly specialised ambush predator, one of the world’s most formidable venomous fishes, and an extraordinary aquarium education animal.
Well done to everyone who picked Synanceia verrucosa — extra nerd points for the scientific name.

12/08/2026

SUPER MARINE NERD CHALLENGE 🧐🌊

The last few have been getting solved a little too quickly, so this week we’re widening the net…

What exactly are you looking at?

It could be a fish. It could be an invertebrate. It could be something else entirely. We’re giving you no clues this week — the photo is all you get.

We want the species, not just “some sort of reef critter”. Common name will get you there, but scientific name earns maximum fish-nerd — or perhaps marine-nerd — respect.

We love our fish nerds at Cairns Marine (and proudly are!), so have a proper look before you commit. There is definitely something looking back at you.

As always, no prizes — just bragging rights and recognition for those who nail it.

Drop your answer in the comments. Reveal tomorrow at 6:00 pm Cairns time.

10/08/2026

When we say we have a lot of stock on hand… we mean a LOT of stock. 🐠🇦🇺

This is just a quick look through some of the intermediate and larger fishes moving through Cairns Marine right now — a mix of PAq animals and standout display fish, all receiving the same professional husbandry and care.

Public aquaria around the world rely on us for Australian marine life that is selectively hand caught, carefully handled and backed by known provenance. This isn’t just hobby-scale stock. Many of these animals are selected and conditioned for major exhibits, long-term collections and breeding programs, with the husbandry, handling and logistics behind them to match.

That is a big part of the Cairns Marine difference. We collect our own animals, know where they came from, care for them in purpose-built systems and understand what it takes to prepare and move them safely around the world. It is hard to walk through a major public aquarium without finding animals that have passed through Cairns Marine somewhere along the way.

Transparent+Traceable+Managed=Sustainable.

From reef to aquarium, we are proud to keep waving the flag for Australian hand-caught marine life. 🇦🇺

08/08/2026

Proud to wave the Aussie hand-caught banner 🇦🇺

A great post from one of our clients comparing their USA and Australian marine fish deliveries side by side.

What we particularly appreciated was hearing them talk openly about the difference they see in some species — fish that consistently arrive strongly and thrive when sourced from Australia, while the same species from other origins can sometimes simply fade away.

That doesn’t happen by accident. Australian hand collection, careful handling, experienced divers, short supply chains and a genuine focus on the condition of every animal all make a difference.

We are very proud of the fish we send, but it means a lot more when the people receiving and caring for them recognise that quality for themselves.
If you value Australian hand-caught marine fish, support the businesses that continue to back them. They are supporting a fishery, a supply chain and a standard of collection that Australia should be proud of.

Thanks for the shout-out — and for continuing to support Aussie collected fish. 🇦🇺🐠

A few weeks ago we did a special USA fish import unboxing and it ge...

07/08/2026

Today marks a real changing of the guard at Cairns Marine, with Matt Maloney — better known to many as “Nano Matt” — and Chris Bache finishing up with us.

Between them, Matt and Chris represent more than 40 years of Cairns Marine history.

Matt started with us as a diver and went on to work across just about every part of the business over the years. He has been part of Cairns Marine through an enormous amount of change and growth, and his knowledge and experience have become part of the fabric of the place.

Chris started with us in maintenance and quickly became one of those rare people who could turn his hand to almost anything. He played a huge role in building the famous Cairns Marine transport containers used for our public aquarium shipments around the world, while also spending plenty of time on the water collecting many of the unusual and special animals that have become such a big part of what Cairns Marine is known for.

Both have contributed an enormous amount to Cairns Marine over many years. They have helped build the business, solve countless problems, pass on knowledge and shape the company into what it is today.

We will miss having them around, and we will always be grateful for what they have given to Cairns Marine.

Matt and Chris, thank you for everything. We wish you both the very best for whatever comes next

06/08/2026

🐟 SUPER FISH NERD CHALLENGE — THE REVEAL 🐟

This week’s mystery eye belonged to the Humpnose Unicornfish, Naso tonganus. The Beluga's of the fish world. The selectively hand-collected adults in this video are currently in holding at Cairns Marine before travelling to public aquariums around the world.

Congratulations to our first two correct fish nerds: Johannes H. Steen and Nguyễn Nam Phương : another week on the list!. Thanks to everyone who had a go.

These are terrific fish for large mixed-species exhibits. They are active, confident swimmers that spend plenty of time high in the water column, where visitors can actually see them, and they graze algae as part of a varied diet. In our experience, sharks also show remarkably little interest in eating them — a very useful quality when some of your future tankmates come with several rows of teeth. Big, visible, useful and apparently not especially delicious: that is a strong aquarium résumé.

A new Super Fish Nerd Challenge lands every Wednesday at 6:00 pm Cairns time, with the answer revealed each Thursday at 6:00 pm.

05/08/2026

🐟 SUPER FISH NERD CHALLENGE 🐟

We love our fish nerds at Cairns Marine — and we proudly are a bunch of fish nerds ourselves.

This week we are getting right up in the face of our mystery fish. There is no full-body profile, no helpful tail and no obvious fin shape to make things easy. All you have to work with is the eye, skin texture, facial structure and a few subtle markings.

For a proper fish nerd, that might be more than enough. Can you identify the species? For a complete answer, we need both the:

Common name
Scientific name

The first two people to provide the full correct identification will be recognised in tomorrow’s answer reveal. As always, there are no prizes — just fish-nerd glory, bragging rights and the satisfaction of identifying a fish from what is essentially one very suspicious-looking eyeball.

Put your answer in the comments, but please do not add links or photographs that might give the answer away for everyone else. NO cheating and using AI!

Our standing challenge times are:

🐠 New challenge every Wednesday at 6:00 pm Cairns time
🐠 Answer revealed every Thursday at 6:00 pm Cairns time

Good luck, fish nerds.