Coral reefs are dangerous places to hang out if you’re small and tasty. There are many mouths out to get you and now there’s one more thing to worry about: mobs of fish rampaging the reef in search of dinner.
Recently here at Seamonster we’ve had fish brandishing tools and now we have cunning fish joining forces and hunting together in fearsome gangs. Nothing gets between a fish and its food.
A neat study hits the science news headlines today announcing the discovery that yellow saddle goatfish in the Red Sea get together and hunt cooperatively in groups. On any given day, some fish act as Blockers, sealing escape routes and making it easier for Chasers to corner their prey.
And perhaps this behaviour in yellow goatfish should come as little surprise, after they were caught on camera by the BBC a while ago, working in tandem not with members of their own species, but alongside trevally and sea snakes hunting in packs on reefs in Indonesia: Check out the video clip from the BBC and listen to the soothing words of David Attenborough.
The team behind this latest fishy discovery have also eavesdropped on other reef inhabitants hunting together. Back in 2006, Redouan Bshary and co. published a paper revealing how groupers and giant moray eels not only team up but they talk about it first. Groupers signal to moray eels when they want some help in hunting and the hungrier they are the more they do it.
ht to VaranusSalvator.
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