#batfishes

O. cubifrons reportedly grows to 38 centimeters or 15 inches long: but specimens collected for the aquarium trade, are more typically 12 to 20 centimeters, or about 5 to 8 inches, which is not full grown. Such a maximum size as described must, however, be exceptional. This anglerfish is native to open sea bottoms in the shallow waters from North Carolina, southwards to Cuba and the Yucatan Peninsula. It is thus associated with the Caribbean Sea, and the Gulf of Mexico, and also the Bahamas. As it is found on rocky as well as soft seabed, it's habitat requirement appears to be a low relief seabed The reason these animals are not more often traded, is their poor survivability, which is due to unthoughtful practices during the time between the ocean and out tanks. Fortunately, advances in knowledge have been made by public aquariums, that help us understand why these fish have high mortality - and how to avoid this problem

Walking batfish are named for their amazing ability to walk, which is possible because their paired fins have evolved into bona fide walking limbs. As they move they keep their belly clear of the substrate, and employ a land vertebrate-type gait. Their pectoral fins and those of their close cousins, the frogfishes, have been well studied and compared to those of land vertebrates. Similarities include a ball and socket joint at the shoulder, an elbow, and something very like a wrist. The musculature is similarly modified to allow these joints to function as a true leg.

Batfishes and frogfishes are different in details of their forelimb anatomy, reflecting their lifestyle; frogfish forelimbs resemble toed feet in their ability to deal with complex substrates, whereas batfishes lack this skill but their walking strides are more powerful, as befits low relief, open habitats. The gaits of both frogfishes and batfishes have been compared to those of four footed land animals, although both types of anglerfishes are strictly submarine (Interestingly the limbs and even toed feet of ancestral four footed animals, are now thought to have evolved before the conquest of the land )

Although walking batfishes are gape limited suction predators, like their frogfish allies, they do not share the same cavernous maws, and take smaller prey items, as well as inhabiting different types of sea bottom. As expected for an anglerfish, batfishes entice victims close using twitches of a lure (or esca), which has evolved from their anterior dorsal fin rays. Anglerfishes actually twitch a fishing rod that belongs to their body. Unlike deep sea anglerfishes, walking batfishes do not have a glowing lure; but evidence indicates that they possess complex, glandular structures in their esca, that are used for secreting chemical attractants into the water.

They have been proven to lure in scavenging carnivores, such as dog whelks, as prey. Such small animals are often deliberately introduced to aquariums because they are helpful scavengers, or they enter aquaria accidentally but nonetheless are desirable and helpful. Walking batfish are obviously a danger to such 'janitors' and are plainly incompatible with, for example, the snails called nassas. However they do not consume corals in the least, and it would be wrong to think of these anglerfish as consuming tankmates nearly their own size. Their diet does, however, include crustaceans and small fishes, which again limits their compatibility in the reef tank.

In the aquarium walking batfishes have a poor survival rate upon import. The sad fact is that these fish often carry high parasite loads, to which they succumb when they arrive stressed by the process of their importation and acclimatization Other than this, they do not really deserve a reputation, as hard to care for in the aquarium. Public aquariums have obtained healthy specimens and kept them long term without difficulties; though they have found a good de-worming to be the key to walking batfish survival. As with some other aquarium pets, their care of a healthy batfish is simply atypical; people have assumptions about how to care for a fish, that do not apply to all aquarium fishes.

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(R 14.05.2020): New Post!