The yellow-belly flounder gives itself away from below. The upper surface is dark olive-green with large dark-edged scales that blend with estuarine sediment and pass without comment. Turn it over and the underside, white in juveniles, reveals itself in adults as pale yellow with dark spots, the character that names the species and that Māori described as pātiki tōtara, the totara-coloured flatfish. Rhombosolea leporina is a righteye flounder endemic to New Zealand, short-bodied and oval, plumper and rounder than the sand flounder it shares many habitats with, and easily distinguished from it by those larger scales and the characteristic belly colouring. Both eyes sit on the right side of the head, positioned further back from the pointed snout than in most flounder species, because the eyes on this fish are not primarily for finding food. Small crustaceans, molluscs, and worms buried in soft sediment are located instead by touch: the anterior rays of the dorsal fin carry sensory cells that detect movement in the substrate, and taste buds on the fin rays and on the blind side of the head allow the fish to identify edible material from a mouthful of mud before committing to swallowing it. This is a sophisticated system for an animal that looks, at first glance, like something that has made peace with lying still. The life cycle is structured around a habitat sequence. Larvae drift inshore and settle on sun-warmed shallow mudflats, where juveniles remain for up to two years. As they grow, they move progressively into deeper estuarine channels and then offshore, with adults spawning in coastal waters at 30 to 50 metres depth during spring. Adults migrate back to inshore feeding grounds through summer and autumn. Females grow faster and larger than males, reaching maturity at around 29 centimetres, males at 24, and the largest females produce upward of a million eggs in a single spawning event. The yellow-belly flounder is most abundant in the Kaipara and Manukau harbours and the Firth of Thames, where set-netting has been a consistent fishery for generations. It is managed under the Quota Management System as part of the flatfish group. The estuarine habitats it depends on for juvenile development remain under pressure from sedimentation and coastal development along the northern coastline. A fish that needs healthy mudflats at the start of its life is exposed to everything that damages those mudflats, which in the northern North Island is a long list.