Spotted Handfish — printable fact sheet
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Spotted Handfish
Brachionichthys hirsutus
The spotted handfish (Brachionichthys hirsutus) is a small, slow anglerfish relative that does not swim so much as walk, using arm-like modified pectoral and pelvic fins with fleshy "hands" to pace across the silty bottom of the Derwent Estuary in Tasmania. It is one of the most…
Did you know?
- The Spotted Handfish is so rare that it was once believed to be extinct before being rediscovered in the 1990s.
- It walks on modified fins rather than swimming, and a startled handfish will typically stroll away rather than flee. There is no larval dispersal stage, so a colony that is wiped out will not be replaced from anywhere else. Divers have installed hundreds of artificial ceramic spawning stalks on the seabed to replace the sea squirts eaten out by an invasive starfish, and the fish lay on them. It was the first marine fish in the world to be listed as Critically Endangered.
What I learned
Draw the spotted handfish
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