Longlure Frogfish Research Paper

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The Longlure Frogfish can be found in the tropical western part of the Atlantic Ocean next to sea sponges. It is disbursed from Bermuda and the Bahamas to the coasts of the central and south America. It is referred to as a frogfish because of its similar characteristics compared to those of a frog. The Frogfish has really thick skin and highly modified scales called dermal spicules. It is round and short, generally growing up to 11cm. Since one of their main purposes is to prey for food, they rarely use their fins to swim and instead, they have fins that act as feet which help them walk across the ocean. It has very small eyes and a large mouth pointing up which helps them eat their prey. Their big mouth allows them to eat big animals. Usually, …show more content…

They have a lure called an elongated illicit on one of its dorsal spines. They use this lure just like a fisherman uses a fishing pole to catch food. The illicit is modified into a long rod with a lure at the end which looks like a small fish or shrimp. It uses its color and black spots to seemingly camouflage from potential prey next a sponge of similar color. It then waits there until it sees a fish swimming by. As soon as it spots its next victim its plan of attack commences. It first wiggles its lure to attract the fish towards it; when the fish is close enough, it quickly swallow it. All of this happens it a matter of 1/6th of a second. If they are not able to catch prey by their initial location they will relocate until they find a good amount of food. A possible hypothesis for why it developed this elongated illicit is because it is not a fast swimmer and therefore, it was not able to keep up with the other fish it wanted to consume. Its color also makes it really visible when it is not next to a sponge; so if it did not have the elongated illicit it would have to swim or walk around the ocean to find prey, but it was never able to catch any prey because of it color and size. The elongated illicit allows it to catch prey by staying mobilized and it does not need to swim around to find prey. Another unique trait is that their eggs are

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