There are a bunch rare fish to find in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, including the Stringfish. It's only available for four months of the year which will be different depending on your hemisphere) and then only in one specific location on your island, which makes it a touch rarer than the Golden Trout, a fish you catch in precisely the same location. If you've already caught that then you know where to go and what to do already. If you haven't hooked a Golden Trout just yet, below we'll go over the steps to catching its slightly rarer sister fish, the Stringfish.
If you're after information about every fish in New Horizons and general tips on how to hook them, check out our Animal Crossing: New Horizons fish guide and list for all the fishy facts you could want.
Animal Crossing: New Horizons - Catch the Stringfish
When can you catch the Stringfish?
The Stringfish is only available at the following times of the day/year:
- Time
- 4pm - 9am
- Month (Hemisphere)
- Dec-Mar (N) / Jun-Sep (S)
Where is the Stringfish?
Like the Golden Trout, the Stringfish can only be found in elevated streams on your island, ideally the highest point on your island (the highest clifftop pool with a waterfall). There's no point hoping to catch the Stringfish in any sea-level river location, although as you can see from our pictorial evidence, it is possible to catch the Stringfish (and the Golden Trout) in the stream below your clifftop waterfall (on the first level above sea level) and not only on the highest plateau.
How do you catch the Stringfish?
The trick to catching the Stringfish is to craft fish bait using the squirting Manila Clams you dig up on the beach in order to have the rare fish spawn. Each clam can be crafted into a single helping of fish bait which you can sprinkle in any body of water for the shadow of a fish to appear.
To catch the Stringfish we dug up Manila Clams from the beach using our shovel and crafted them all into fish bait.
We then went to the highest clifftop area and threw the fish bait in the water there. After experiencing some good luck with the Golden Trout, the game seemingly took its revenge with the Stringfish. While some of the Nintendo Life team hooked one relatively quickly, others crafted over 100 bait to catch the blighter.
After hooking a load of more common fish, we eventually pulled it out the mighty Stringfish! Note that we weren't actually standing the highest level of our island, either. It seems you just need to be 'near' that body of water and the fish should spawn. Perhaps we got lucky - we'd recommend fishing above the waterfall rather than below it just to be on the safe side.
Of course, the fish will still spawn in the spot without the use of bait, too, but the chances of a fish being present in that clifftop body of water and it being a Stringfish are far fewer than if you use bait to spawn new fish repeatedly in that location.
How much is the Stringfish worth?
The rare Stringfish is worth 15,000 Bells if you sell it to Timmy and Tommy (or 12,000 Bells if you leave it in the Nook's Cranny Drop Box). Make sure you donate one to the Museum, though! Blathers will be pleased.
This article is part of our Animal Crossing: New Horizons walkthrough, which includes a Complete Fish List, Complete Bug List and Complete Sea Creatures List. If you're looking for specific fish or bugs, we can tell you how to catch the elusive Coelacanth, Mahi-Mahi, Giant Trevally, Stringfish, Golden Trout and all the Sharks and Beetles, along with a full list of critters leaving at the end of the month (unless you visit Kapp'n's Boat Tour islands, of course!).
We can also help with How to Spot Redd's Fake Paintings and Statues, How to Make Bells Fast, How to Breed Flowers, How to Get more DIY Recipes, How to Upgrade Nook's Cranny, where and when to find special characters like Gulliver, Sable, Label, Wisp, Celeste, Pirate Gulliver and Jack, plus tips on using the Star Wand, Tool Ring, Rock Trick, Cutting Down and Moving Trees, using amiibo on Harv's Island, How to Back Up Your Island Data, How to Time Travel, How to Get a 5-Star Island Rating and a whole lot more.
If it's new content you're looking for help with, we can help you find gyroids, unlock Brewster's café, use the new Pro Camera App for selfies, enact new ordinances, get the beloved Froggy Chair, and even learn How to Cook.
And finally, Where to Buy Animal Crossing: New Horizons on Nintendo Switch, if for some reason you haven't yet picked up the game, and How To Buy The Happy Home Paradise DLC, too!
Comments 8
Thanks! This stringfish has been stringing me along...
This is my first Animal Crossing game so I was wondering, is there any reason to keep fish/bugs or should I sell them? I'm still waiting for the museum and the shop to be built so I'm not sure what to do with all of the things that I'm catching.
The string fish is taking me a bit of time to get. Laughably I was trying to catch it and got a golden trout instead. They also can spawn in the river under the tallest waterfall.
Still no Stringfish for me. But I finally caught Sturgeon ( at the end of the river near the ocean by the rock around midnight, slow moving big shadow. If any one want to try their luck. ). and also caught Golden Trout twice.
@Hordak No real reason to keep them unless you're an enthusiast. If you have one in the museum already, I'd suggest selling them
@Hordak I donate the first of everything I catch to the museum and sell the rest, but some people fill their homes with fish and now you can pile them up outside too. Whatever floats your boat
Finally caught one, I caught it a 5ish pm at one of the tropical islands, it took 115 things of fish bait. I caught roughly 7 golden trout in the process.
I spent almost 90 bait but never found the Stringfish before time ran out.
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