English language common names include spotted seatrout, seatrout, speckled seatrout, spotted squeteague, spotted trout, and spotted weakfish. Other common names include acoupa pintade (French), corvina (Spanish), corvinata pintada (Spanish), corvinata-pintada (Portuguese), curvina (Spanish), gefleckter umberfisch (German), kulbiniec plamiasty (Poland), plettet skorfisk (Danish), plettet trommefisk (Danish), pyatnistyi gorbyl' (Russian), and trucha de mar (Spanish).
Geographical Distribution
With a range limited to the western Atlantic Ocean, the spotted seatrout is found from Cape Cod, Massachusetts to southern Florida and throughout the entire Gulf of Mexico.
Habitat
The spotted seatrout is a demersal fish that is found in brackish to marine water. It has been observed in shallow coastal and estuarine waters over sandy bottoms and seagrass to depths of 33 feet (10 m). This euryhaline fish also resides in salt marshes and tidal pools of salinities up to 75?? (parts per thousand).
During the warm summer months, spotted seatrout associate with seagrass beds, moving to deeper pockets of water in estuaries during the cooler months. They rarely migrate far from estuaries where they are spawned.
