Fish/Fishes Plural

That is my understanding as well. But you might not want to understand things as I do, so seek further.


On the other hand, no one will protest the plural "fish" in most instances.

Dictionary.com Unabridged
fish noun, plural (especially collectively

) fish

(especially referring to two or more kinds or species

) fish·es, verb

I'm no scientist so I'll let an American scientist tell us about that field.

In common parlance, American Standard English will always use fish as plural while (whilst if you are British) British Standard English will always use fishes as plural.

Silver-tongued Devil said:

I'm no scientist so I'll let an American scientist tell us about that field.

In common parlance, American Standard English will always use fish as plural while (whilst if you are British) British Standard English will always use fishes as plural.

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That's a new one on me! AFAIK, we use "fish" to mean a group of fish as a whole - e.g. "There are a lot of fish in that lake" - but "fishes" when we are thinking of them as individuals - e.g. "See those little fishes swimming around down there?"

Varthikes said:

This issue came up in the "Post the Last Paragraph You've Written Today" Thread.

Fish plural:

It's "fish" when it's a single species, "fishes" when it's more than one species, right?

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Not necessary a single species, but collectively as well. Fishes is basically similar to "peoples" as in distinctive groups (species for fish).

Redfox,
I have no idea how you distinguish between the fishes "down there" and all the other fish in the lake that are not down there. Give me your best explanation of how you decide this one based on fish(es) that have emerged from the lake so they are neither among the great mass of fish in the lake nor are they "down there":

If there are a lot of fish in the lake and you catch three of them, have you caught three of those fish or did you catch three of those fishes?

(Please keep "those" in the sentence to identify the caught fish(es) as having been among the uncaught masses previously. Thanks.)

Fishy, fishy, fishy, fish.

Sorry. It needed saying. Ignore my derail.