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A fish is any aquatic vertebrate animal that is covered with scales, and equipped with two sets of paired fins and several unpaired fins. Most fish are "cold-blooded", or ectothermic, allowing their body temperatures to vary as ambient temperatures change. Fish are abundant in most bodies of water. They can be found in nearly all aquatic environments, from high mountain streams (e.g., char and gudgeon) to the abyssal and even hadal depths of the deepest oceans (e.g., gulpers and anglerfish). At 31,900 species, fish exhibit greater species diversity than any other class of vertebrates. Food prepared from animals classified as fish is also referred to as fish, and is an important human food source. Commercial and subsistence fishers hunt fish in wild fisheries (see fishing) or farm them in ponds or in cages in the ocean (see aquaculture). They are also caught by recreational fishers and raised by fishkeepers, and are exhibited in public aquaria. Fish have had a role in culture through the
The term "fish" most precisely describes any non-tetrapod craniate (i.e. an animal with a skull and in most cases a backbone) that has gills throughout life and whose limbs, if any, are in the shape of fins. Unlike groupings such as birds or mammals, fish are not a single clade but a paraphyletic collection of taxa, including hagfishes, lampreys, sharks and rays, ray-finned fish, coelacanths, and lungfish. Indeed, lungfish and coelacanths are closer relatives of tetrapods (such as mammals, birds, amphibians, etc.) than of other fish such as ray-finned fish or sharks, so the last common ancestor of all fish is also an ancestor to tetrapods. As paraphyletic groups are no longer recognised in modern systematic biology, the use of the term "fish" as a biological group must be avoided.
Fish come in many shapes and sizes. This is a sea dragon, a close relative of the seahorse. Their leaf-like appendages enable them to blend in with floating seaweed. AnatomyMain article: Fish anatomy
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The anatomy of Lampanyctodes hectoris (1) – operculum (gill cover), (2) – lateral line, (3) – dorsal fin, (4) – fat fin, (5) – caudal peduncle, (6) – caudal fin, (7) – anal fin, (8) – photophores, (9) – pelvic fins (paired), (10) – pectoral fins (paired) 
A 3-tonne (3.0 LT; 3.3 ST) great white shark off Isla Guadalupe In the Book of Jonah a "great fish" swallowed Jonah the Prophet. Legends of half-human, half-fish mermaids have featured in stories like those of Hans Christian Andersen and movies like Splash (See Merman, Mermaid). Among the deities said to take the form of a fish are Ika-Roa of the Polynesians, Dagon of various ancient Semitic peoples, the shark-gods of Hawaiʻi and Matsya of the Dravidas of India. The astrological symbol Pisces is based on a constellation of the same name, but there is also a second fish constellation in the night sky, Piscis Austrinus. Fish have been used figuratively in many different ways, for example the ichthys used by early Christians to identify themselves, through to the fish as a symbol of fertility among Bengalis. 
Fish and chips is a popular take-away food that originated in the United Kingdom in 1858 or 1863. It consists of deep-fried fish (traditionally cod or in Australia, flake, but sometimes haddock or plaice) covered in batterâ€â€or sometimes breadcrumbsâ€â€accompanied by deep-fried chipped (slab-cut) potatoes.
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