educational - show me a picture and tell me a thing about it...

[Dangerdoll]

ok, here's the deal. There are tons of fish species out there, some awesome, some gruesome. The rule for this thread is find a good picture of either the ugliest, most interesting, most bizarre, or most beautiful fish ever and tell me a little fact about it. The fact should not be that it's awesome or gruesome or interesting. Lets put a little research out there...... I'll start.

My choice of most bizarre is the Goblin Shark. It is found in all oceans. It has a longer nose than any other shark in the oceans, and swims deeper. They were discovered in the waters off Japan’s coast, and they have pink skin. It is without a doubt, the ugliest shark I have ever seen. And I love sharks!

 

[Slappy*McFish]

Neptune Grouper or Garish Hind
'Cephalopholis igarashiensis'



One of my favorite fish. They're only rarely seen in the aquarium trade as they're difficult to collect at the 250-800 ft depths (in the Indo-Pacific) where they commonly live. They command a hefty price tag of $5,000+ easily for small specimens. They can grow upwards of 17" and feed mainly on smaller fishes and crustaceans.

 

[ConnerFish]

Ok I'll play! My fish will be the Coelacanth. They are a primitive style of fish, thought of as a living fossil. They can live for over 400 years it is thought.

 

[Dangerdoll]

love 'em, keep 'em coming!

 

[maverickbr77]

Macropinna microstoma!

It is recognized for a highly unusual transparent, fluid-filled dome on its head, through which the lenses of its eyes can be seen. The eyes have a barrel shape and can be rotated to point either forward or straight up, looking through the fish's transparent dome.

 

[Juice]

Okay, I choose the extremely ugly Blobfish
This bloated bottom dweller inhabits the deep waters off the coasts of mainland Australia and Tasmania. It can grow up to 12 inches and lives at depths of up to 600 to 1200m, which would make life impossible for most fish, as the pressure is roughly 80x more than at sea level.
The reason the blobfish is able to survive at such a depth is because it lacks a gas bladder. The blobfishes flesh is mostly a gelatinous mass with a density slightly less than that of water, allowing the fish to float above the sea floor without expending energy on swimming.
Due to increasing fishing of the seas down under, this fish is being dragged up with other catches and is currently facing extinction.

 

[louxrs]

I would have to say the Dragon Fish! Saw these guys at the Baltimore Aquarium.

 

[Zaffy]

Hi, I'm a Hagfish, some people call me a slime eel, but I'm not an eel.


I live deep in the ocean on muddy sea floors. It's very dark where I live, and I can't see very well at all.

I scavenge the sea floor looking for food. I don't have jaws, but I do have a single tooth on the roof of my mouth, and two rows of teeth on my tongue. I use them to grab my food. Because I don't have jaws it's very hard to bite, so instead I tie myself into a knot so I can get leverage to pull my food apart.

[YT]RrPvMMkQkk0[/YT]

When I'm scared I release proteins that react with sea water and produce a whole lot of slime. The slime is hard to eat, so it protects me from predators who want to eat me.

[YT]Bb2EOP3ohnE[/YT]

 

[jpappy789]

Haplophryne mollis, also known as the soft leafvent angler is one of several anglerfishes that employs a rather unusual reproductive strategy. Because finding mates at the bottom of the ocean is such a difficult task, males literally parasitize the females. So what you see in the pictures are the full grown females and attached are the reduced males.

The males actually lose their digestive system as they mature. They can sense the pheromones produced by the females and just bite into the skin of a female when one is found. They supposedly fuse blood vessels so that the male can release sperm in response to the female's hormone levels, which indicate egg release. Weird, eh?

 

[To3kn33]

Man this thread has amazed and repulsed me with equal measure....