See many ribbonfish on the reefs?

[RickI]

I saw one of these in 90 ft. of water near the surface along a sargassum weed line and a ton of moon jellys today off Ft. Lauderdale on the Sea Experience. It looks like the moon jelly population explosion this year may be worse than last year from early impressions btw. They kept clogging up my dive scooter in a honking strong south running current. Later, I think I saw a school of these guys on the second dive in about 25 ft. of water over the second reef. A group of about 20 individuals were schooling fairly close together, aligned head down over a sand area.

I don't recall having seen any of these guys on or around the reefs before. Have many others seen these very commonly on South Florida reefs or in pelagic areas?

Thanks,

 

[smellzlikefish]

ribbonfish are a common pelagic species known to migrate vertically. It sounds like you may have come across a group that got lost ovr soe shallow water. Cool fish!

 

[RickI]

Thanks for your input, your explanation makes sense. Just looking around online, the one in the photo resembled a ribbonfish. There seems to be a bunch of lay names for similar fish, dealfish, ribbonfish, cutlassfish and still others. It seems like it is from the Family Trachipteridae but am not quite uncertain were it falls below that. I am not sure how common they are in our waters yet. Aside from that I don't recall seeing them on our reefs in over 40 years. Then again, maybe I just missed them. We did have a ripping south current, possibly a gyre off the Florida Current bringing stuff closer to shore from deep water. I was concerned it might be another bizarre invader although it doesn't look like a cute aquarium candidate. More like something from deepwater from the aphotic zone.

I put up a video of the single individual that I saw at:
http://fksa.org/showthread.php?p=50194#post50194

Have many of these been seen on or around South Florida reefs by others?

ribbonfish are a common pelagic species known to migrate vertically. It sounds like you may have come across a group that got lost ovr soe shallow water. Cool fish!

 

[dumpsterDiver]

I used to see them pretty commonly on night beach dives off Vero Beach; depth 22 ft or less. Often spotted several at a time. Very weird fish, at night you swim right up t them without noticing them if turned with knife edge toward you, then they rotate and the silver side flashes in your eye. They tend to freak and dart when a light is shined on them at night.. Don't think i ever saw one in the day.

 

[RickI]

Good to know, that you for passing this along. When you saw several at a time did they school in a clump, nose down parallel to one another near the bottom? Must have been quite a sight at night particularly with those nice sets of teeth. Have you heard of similar sightings further south, say around West Palm Beach and points south?

 

[dumpsterDiver]

I think they used to stay face up... I heard people saw a bunch in the day in stuart maybe a month ago.