whāpuku
1. (noun) groper, grouper, Polyprion oxygeneios - a large heavy-bodied fish with a big head and wide mouth found in warm seas. The head is pointed and has a protruding lower jaw. Blue-grey to brown on back, changing abruptly midbody to dirty white, lightening to pale white ventrally. Circumglobal in subtropical and temperate seas of the Southern Hemisphere.
Hopukia mai e te whāpuku ko ngā māunu, ko ngā mātika me ngā nape haere atu ana ka riro (KO 20/11/1886:8). / The bait, hooks and lines were snatched by the groper fish and carried away.
See also hāpuku
