parrotfish

noun (plural same or parrotfishes)

• 1any of a number of brightly colored marine fish with a parrotlike beak, which they use to scrape food from coral and other hard surfaces.

  • a widespread fish of warm seas that may secrete a mucous cocoon to deter predators (family Scaridae: Scarus and other genera). an edible fish of the southern Indian ocean (Oplegnathus conwayi, family Oplegnathidae).

• 2Australian a brightly colored marine fish, especially one of the wrasse family.

  • Several species in the family Labridae