How Do Anglerfish Work?

Fearsome-looking female anglerfish lure in prey with glowing light in the inky black depths of the ocean and are literally bonded to their mates. Learn more in this episode of BrainStuff, based on this article: https://animals.howstuffworks.com/fish/anglerfish.htm

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to brain Stuff, the production of I Heart Radio. Hey,
brain Stuff, Lauren Boga bam here. Anglerfish have got an
angle all right, but it's probably not to win anyone
over with their intensely toothy looks. Or rather, their end
game is to attract their prey using a form of
fishing known as angling. Oh we're an angle, which is

(00:23):
a sort of bony hook. Protrusion is used to lure
in and catch an unsuspecting fish. That's right, just like
a fisherman sitting with a pole in hand. Anglerfish do
indeed fish, except they do it from the ocean floor.
No tackle boxer bait needed. The carnivorous female anglerfish wait
patiently in the depths of the sparsely populated deep sea

(00:45):
to literally lure in their next meal. They wiggle and
angle a rod like extension of their dorsal spine that
protrudes from their head and amidst light. Once their prey
comes close, the female strikes and stags them, using her large,
pointy teeth to chomp them up, even if they're up
to twice her size and in. Scientists captured images of

(01:08):
a female with numerous thin filaments extending from her body
In addition to her main dorsal appendage, these filaments also
emit light, creating a bioluminescent web of whiskers to attract
and surround their prey. Some species of anglerfish live in
more shallow tropical waters, but the ones that pique the
interests of scientists are those that live in the deep,

(01:31):
murky depths of the ocean, some as deep as sixteen
thousand feet or five thousand meters. For the article this
episode is based on how Stuff Work. Spoke via email
with Ted Pich, a professor at the School of Aquatic
and Fishery Sciences at the University of Washington and author
of Oceanic Anglerfish is Extraordinary Diversity in the Deep Sea

(01:51):
and whose name I hope I pronounced correctly. He's been
studying the elusive anglerfish almost his entire career. He said,
there are about a hundred and sixty six species so far,
but new ones are still coming up. They live so
deep that we don't really have a good idea of
how big they actually get. We send nets down to
collect them, and the deeper we go, the larger specimens

(02:13):
come up. But how do they manage to stay so
close to the ocean floor at such depths. Pich shares
that most anglerfish, along with some other deep sea fish,
don't have a swim bladder. That's the gas filled sack
that helps many fish stay afloat without the need to
constantly swim. The lack of a swim bladder not only

(02:34):
helps anglerfish stay near the bottom, it also conserves energy,
energy that's at a premium given the difficulty of finding
a meal so far down. Female anglerfish are definitely running
the deep sea show, Piche explained. Most females aren't much
larger than your fist, but other species are close to
four feet that's one point two meters long. A male

(02:56):
angler fish, on the other hand, is usually an inch
two and a half centimeter are so long in the
most extreme cases, the female is sixty times the length
and about half a million times as heavy as the male.
The male, who has no way to feed itself, must
rely completely on the female for survival. A male will
actually merge with a female, not because they're in love,

(03:19):
a Piche said. They the males have tiny pincher like
teeth on the tip of their snout and they bite
on to the female. The blood flow from the female
to the male provides the nutrients if they don't find
a female their toast. The scientists believe the female emits
alluring pheromones that the male can sniff out with his
proportionately large nostrils. Their relationship really is quite unique. A

(03:43):
Pipe said, these are the only animals in the world
that attach permanently and exchange fluid. Scientists note that the
size difference is a survival mechanism that allows them to
thrive on the limited deep sea menu. If they were
both large, it would take a whole lot more food
and enter g to keep them alive and keep their
unique reproductive cycle going. While the female has to carry

(04:06):
the little guy around and keep him fed, she's also
getting a pretty good deal out of it too. There's
no need to put herself out there to attract a
loyal partner. She's got a sperm bank or two, or
three or even six available to fertilize her eggs. Luckily,
for anglerfish and the ecosystem, you won't find them making

(04:27):
an appearance on anyone's dinner plate. And it's not just
because they're elusive and scary to look at. Piche says,
they're fatty and oily composition wouldn't make for a very
tasty meal. Well, that is, unless you're talking to a
sperm whale. Anglerfish remains have been found in whale stomachs
and they seem to be the main predator of the
larger anglerfish species. While it's extremely challenging to find angler

(04:52):
fish and there's still somewhat of a mystery, scientists are
entering a new realm of studying their behavior, and while
scary looking teeth and dismaying face may not look appealing
to most of us humans, they continue to light up
the deep sea, attracting an oh so lucky male anglerfish
right along with their next deep sea dinner. Today's episode

(05:17):
is based on the article the deep Ocean anglerfish catches
Prey with the Lure on its Head on how stuff
works dot Com, written by Katie Carmen. Brain Stuff is
production of I Heart Radio and partnership with how stuff
Works dot Com, and it's produced by Tyler Clang. Four
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