Snailfish? Clingfish?
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Biodiversity_Guy
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Snailfish? Clingfish?
I would love some help with this ID. It was on kelp near the Neah Bay Jetty.
Re: Snailfish? Clingfish?
I'm gonna go with a snailfish, but I couldn't say which brand. Looking at Milton's book, I'd venture a guess of tidepool snailfish, but don't hold me to that.
Dave
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nwscubamom
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Re: Snailfish? Clingfish?
Definitely snailfish - possibly a Lobefin or a Tidepool. (see the dorsal fin)
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Greg Jensen
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Re: Snailfish? Clingfish?
I'd say tidepool. Lobefins have really tiny eyes, noticeably smaller than this one has.
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Tidepool Geek
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Re: Snailfish? Clingfish?
Howdy,
The fish pictured seems to have a scalloped appearance around the mouth. I can't find a reference about this or a photo showing this feature in my (rather limited) library or on the Fishbase site - looking at both Lobefin and Tidepool snailfish. Is this a variable characteristic or am I just seeing things?
As an aside, we've had a few of these at the Feiro Center over the years and we always assumed that they were Tidepools (for no particular reason). After reading this thread I'm thinking that we maybe had Lobefins instead. Ours did have very small eyes - and seemed to have really poor eyesight as well. We had a great deal of trouble feeding them anything but live food as they seemed to show no interest in chopped fish or shrimp (which most of our fish eat readily). When live food was offered the snailfish would somehow detect its presence in the tank and would immediately proceed to hunt the prey down with impressive efficiency - even if the prey (amphipods or baby sculpins) was on the opposite side of the tank.
Through pure luck we have since discovered that they would eat dead food but only when the fish had been fed live food from a handler's cupped hand and thus learned that 'the huge pale thing is a food dispenser!' After that they would readily accept hand fed chopped fish - literally diving into the offered hand and chomping sort of randomly until the food was gone. After watching these behaviors we became convinced that our snailfish had the eyesight of a Mr. Magoo and were hunting live prey by using some other sense or combination of senses.
Sensibly yours,
Alex
The fish pictured seems to have a scalloped appearance around the mouth. I can't find a reference about this or a photo showing this feature in my (rather limited) library or on the Fishbase site - looking at both Lobefin and Tidepool snailfish. Is this a variable characteristic or am I just seeing things?
As an aside, we've had a few of these at the Feiro Center over the years and we always assumed that they were Tidepools (for no particular reason). After reading this thread I'm thinking that we maybe had Lobefins instead. Ours did have very small eyes - and seemed to have really poor eyesight as well. We had a great deal of trouble feeding them anything but live food as they seemed to show no interest in chopped fish or shrimp (which most of our fish eat readily). When live food was offered the snailfish would somehow detect its presence in the tank and would immediately proceed to hunt the prey down with impressive efficiency - even if the prey (amphipods or baby sculpins) was on the opposite side of the tank.
Through pure luck we have since discovered that they would eat dead food but only when the fish had been fed live food from a handler's cupped hand and thus learned that 'the huge pale thing is a food dispenser!' After that they would readily accept hand fed chopped fish - literally diving into the offered hand and chomping sort of randomly until the food was gone. After watching these behaviors we became convinced that our snailfish had the eyesight of a Mr. Magoo and were hunting live prey by using some other sense or combination of senses.
Sensibly yours,
Alex
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Greg Jensen
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Re: Snailfish? Clingfish?
Several of the local species have that wrinkly-lipped look, and it seems more obvious in larger specimens.
When I used to keep them in my community tank, they'd spend most of the day stuck to the side with their tail wrapped around themselves. I'd feed them by impaling a piece of food on a straw and touching it to the snout; like you noted they don't seem to have very good vision and wouldn't take it otherwise. They were very active in the dark, swimming around poking and bumping into everything in the tank and bothering all the other fish who were just trying to sleep- one of the reasons I quit keeping them.
Interesting that they learned that hand trick- sounds like a lot more fun way to feed them!
When I used to keep them in my community tank, they'd spend most of the day stuck to the side with their tail wrapped around themselves. I'd feed them by impaling a piece of food on a straw and touching it to the snout; like you noted they don't seem to have very good vision and wouldn't take it otherwise. They were very active in the dark, swimming around poking and bumping into everything in the tank and bothering all the other fish who were just trying to sleep- one of the reasons I quit keeping them.
Interesting that they learned that hand trick- sounds like a lot more fun way to feed them!