Meet ‘u’u the Hawaiian Bigscale Soldierfish! This common foot long fish also has another name, Mempachi. This name came from the Japanese who came to Hawaii over 150 years ago and both the Hawaiians and Japanese consider this schooling fish a delicacy.

The Hawaiian name for this fish, lau‘ipala, means “yellow leaf,” and they only occur in large numbers in Hawaii. Sometimes these fish can be seen in such large schools that people can see them from the beach and it looks like gold flowing over the coral reef.