Greenland Halibut

Its morphology with the left eye positioned on the dorsal ridge of the forehead gives it an appearance of a cyclops when looking straight at it. The central position of the left eye in the Greenland halibut probably gives it a much wider range of peripheral vision in comparison to other flatfish, where the eye has migrated completely. Its body shape is elongated and compressed dorsoventrally and muscles on both sides are equally developed. Both sides are pigmented, but the left blind side is slightly lighter in color than the right side. The maximum length is about 120 cm (3.9 ft) and the maximum weight is about 45 kg (99 lb), the normal length is 80–100 cm (2.6–3.3 ft) and they usually weigh 11–25 kg (24–55 lb).

The Greenland halibut is a cold-water species found at depths from near the surface to 2,200 m (7,200 ft), but mainly between 500 and 1,000 m (1,600 and 3,300 ft). It is mainly found in waters with temperatures from 1 to 4 °C (34–39 °F), but has also been observed at subzero temperatures down to −2.1 °C (28.2 °F). It has a circumpolar distribution in the Northern Hemisphere and is found in both the North Atlantic and the North Pacific Oceans. In the North Pacific, it ranges from the Sea of Japan near Honshu northwards to the Chukchi Sea, east through the Aleutian Islands, and south as far as northern Baja California in Mexico. In the North Atlantic, it occurs from the British Isles to northern Norway, Faroe Islands, Iceland, and eastern Greenland in the east and from Newfoundland to northwestern Greenland in the west.