The little frog fish that I saw in Hawaii were certainly cute but this thing was a monstrosity... it was absolutely huge! I estimate that it was at least 7' from tip of rear fins (yes that is plural... it had two tail fins!) to outstretched pectoral fins... maybe more.
It was solitary and hopped along on its fin tips while looking into cracks and holes presumably for prey. I don't know if it is typical of these creatures but it had a light organ on the top of its head as well as one on its left pectoral fin. It had three cylindrical dorsal fins.. the one in the middle being the largest in diameter. The smaller dorsal fin on the right was silver colored. The even smaller dorsal fin on the left was attached to the light organ on the head.
It had two distinct tail fins (both bright yellow) and it used these downward pointing fins along with the much smaller pectoral fins to hop along the bottom. The junction between each tail and yellow fin was marked by several large circular tubes. Very strange looking.
A periodic and frequent geyser of bubbles would erupt from its head. Maybe this was to scare away predators though I don't know what would eat a creature like this.
We watched for a while in amazement but it seemed totally unaware of our presence as we hovered above it. At one point I was tempted to poke it in the back of the head but thought better of it. Who knows how fast something like that can move when startled not to mention that it might have large teeth. Some of the strangely shaped appendages sticking out all over could have been poisonous as well. It seemed to use these appendages to stir up the bottom... possible a feeding behavior... I'm not sure.
I wanted to take a picture but the cloud of dust it was raising would have meant a snow storm of backscatter using the internal flash on my little camera.
It was solitary and hopped along on its fin tips while looking into cracks and holes presumably for prey. I don't know if it is typical of these creatures but it had a light organ on the top of its head as well as one on its left pectoral fin. It had three cylindrical dorsal fins.. the one in the middle being the largest in diameter. The smaller dorsal fin on the right was silver colored. The even smaller dorsal fin on the left was attached to the light organ on the head.
It had two distinct tail fins (both bright yellow) and it used these downward pointing fins along with the much smaller pectoral fins to hop along the bottom. The junction between each tail and yellow fin was marked by several large circular tubes. Very strange looking.
A periodic and frequent geyser of bubbles would erupt from its head. Maybe this was to scare away predators though I don't know what would eat a creature like this.
We watched for a while in amazement but it seemed totally unaware of our presence as we hovered above it. At one point I was tempted to poke it in the back of the head but thought better of it. Who knows how fast something like that can move when startled not to mention that it might have large teeth. Some of the strangely shaped appendages sticking out all over could have been poisonous as well. It seemed to use these appendages to stir up the bottom... possible a feeding behavior... I'm not sure.
I wanted to take a picture but the cloud of dust it was raising would have meant a snow storm of backscatter using the internal flash on my little camera.
