So the other night, my son asks me about this fish he saw in Finding Nemo. Normally I might not share such a tale, because it’s probably only memorable to our family – but the answers found from this innocent question were pretty impressive indeed.
You see, the alleged fish has a light on it’s head and huge fangs. I don’t know about you, but I’d never heard of such a beast. In fact, I thought it sounded like someone had been having a little fun in the animation room. I even made the mistake of mentioning that it might not be completely real!
You can imagine my surprise when I finally found a picture of the fish in question. That’s a freaky fish indeed, and it seems that very little imagination would be necessary to get this fellow looking like a scary fish!
So I looked around some more and found all sorts of information, including this little tidbit that seems to provide all the information you might need (sorry, link died). You see, apparently this vicious beast is the female of the species! And you thought human women were bad! Luckily they only live at depths of 1,600 to 10,000 feet!
The luminous organ on her head actually attracts her prey. She can vibrate the thing, too, presumably to attract prey if they’re blind. The worst part is that the male of the species lives only to bond himself to the body of the female and provide his seed so that the species may continue. He’s also a lot smaller and not quite as strange looking!
Comments
215 responses to “The Angler Fish”
Dori is a Blue Tang. More info can be found above – it’s listed at least three times.
I wanted to know what kind of fish Dory is… does anyone know?
I have always wanted to see an angler fish!
I always thought that the angler fish was real, thankyou for giving me proof. Now i can finaly prove my friend wrong 🙂
OMG–THANK YOU for giving me all of this information on the Angler/Viper fish. I have been arguing with my husband that there is a real fish out there that really is THAT UGLY! Now, I have proof–thank you guys!
Hey, I was searching around and found this site. It really helped me a lot, because I needed to know what kind of fish was on Nemo for a school project. Here’s a good site that shows what kind of fish some of the characters in the movie are:
http://www.classbrain.com/artmovies/publish/article_200.shtml
It shows the name of the character on the movie, the common name, and the scientific name for the main characters. Thanks for your help!
I was impressed by everyone’s arguments. When I first watched the movie and that lit up scarey fish scared the hell out of me, I asked my husband what it was and he told me that it was anangler fish. He would know what it is that he is talking about as he is a deep sea fisherman… however, I do greatly appreciate the entertainment that I recieved while checking it out for myself.
On our first date, my fiance and I went to see Finding Nemo… Of course we bought the movie and are watching it right now! When the angler fish came on, he said that it was surprising how much it looked like the actual fish. I had to see for myself! You’re page has some truly amazing photos! Thank your son for inspiring your curiosity!
Dori is a Paracanthurus hepatus (AKA the Pacific blue tang, the regal tang, the palette tang, the flag-tail tang, and the hippo tang). Hippo tang is probably the most common name for it in today’s world.
This website was really helpful, for my needs. I couldn’t have done my project without it. Thank you so much!