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Pinhead pearlfish

Carapus boraborensis

Photo by lori.tas
Published on Project Noah
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Field Notes

Description:

A species of slender, ray-finned fish in the family Carapidae. It is found in the tropical Indo-Pacific Ocean and normally lives inside the body cavity of a sea cucumber, its prefered host is the leopard sea cucumber (Bohadschia argus).

Habitat:

Lady Elliot Island's shallow coral lagoon, in the Coral sea at the south end of the Great Barrier Reef.

Notes:

This bizarre little fish lives inside the anus of a Leopard sea cucumber (Bohadschia argus). I was filming a number of different fishes in the shallows, and only took a short clip of this sea cucumber. It wasn't until I looked at the footing that I saw the little pearlfish.

Pearlfish get their name from the members of their family that live inside oysters.

Reference Links:

Slendertail Pearlfish - Carapus boraborensis - Overview, Pinhead pearlfish (Carapus boraborensis) - YouTube

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Comments (4)
lori.tas
Sightly better video finally posted. See the anus dwelling fish!
lori.tas
I know. It lives in a sea cucumber bottom! From what I've read the sea cucumber is not getting anything out of the "relationship". Nature, weirder than anything we can imagine. The video I put up at youtube is a too cropped. I'll see if I can fix that so you can see the fish better.

Spotted for Missions

Mission
Global Coral Reef Monitoring
Photographed
PublishedOctober 27, 2013

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