#hagfish

Post: i bet you dont know much about the hagfish. You probably know so little about the hagfish that you don't even know that hagfish could be interesting!

Me: thats really rude to assume of me. Its not an unfair assumption to make of your audience but it is rude. I'll have you know that I Know A Guy. Yeah thats right. I have friends that study fish. And one of them really likes hagfish. And listening to eachothers rants about niche topics is my autistic love language. So yeah, i DO know a thing or two about the hagfish.

and then i go to unpause the video or read the rest of the blog post or whatever because i know enough to know there is more i don't know and then i learn something about hagfish and i send the post to My Hagfish Loving Friend and My Hagfish Loving Friend is like "yay they cited my favorite academic paper in this tumblr post" and then I learn something about my friend which is arguably even more wonderful and important than learning about hagfish.

Ive not encountered a hagfish irl (yet-dreams come true sometimes) but i have hung out with my friend!

On the other hand there have got to be hundreds of thousands of hagfish out there and only one of my friend. Statistically im more likely to accidentally bump into a hagfish than my friend.

But the awesome thing about people is you can see them on purpose! But this is also true of some marine wildlife, if you have a good local aquarium. Hold on- okay no my aquarium doesn't have hagfish. Most dont. What was i saying?

anyway so long as my friend and i are friends, which is something within our own powers it will continue to be more useful fo know about my friend

what level of anthro are we talking about here lol. When it comes to creatures that already have limbs and some manner of recognizable facial features, it's a little easier to find a happy medium between "human with some creature traits" and "sapient creature", but hagfish are pretty far away from that umbrella. you can tell which side has a mouth and which side is the tail, and that's about all they got for recognizable features.

so I guess, on a scale of "sapient hagfish" to "humanoid with some hagfish traits", what's your goal?

(image description: two sketches of hagfish characters. One is just a sapient hagfish, posed almost like a snake. The other is a humanoid figure in a sundress with a flat tail and a hagfish face. hagfish have no eyes, just a big hole and a folded up mouth framed by short fleshy tendrils. end description.)

@favorite-animal-person

Well, it's probably obvious from my name, I love okapis! I also think hagfish are pretty cool.

I am very interested!

Hellbent on the Pacific Hagfish

Pacific hagfish, or California hagfish (Eptatretus stoutii) are one of the most well-known members of the hagfish family. They commonly seen on the ocean floor of the Pacific Ocean, at depths of anywhere between 16–966 metres (52–3,169 ft). They generally prefer muddy substrate, but may also be found on rocky outcroppings with plenty of crevices and caves. Because of their extremely low metabolism, they are also capable of surviving in zero-oxygen environments for several hours.

Like other hagfish, the Pacific hagfish has a long, eel-like body. In fact, hagfish are the only living animals that have a skull but no vertebrae. They also lack jaws, and the perpetually-open mouth is surrounded by a number of barbels. The skin is smooth, loose, and usually purple, pink, or grey. E. stoutii can reach up to 63 cm (25 in) in length; females are typically larger than males. They have very small, rudimentary eyes, and prominent nostrils.

Because they lack fully functioning eyes, California hagfish rely on a combination of smell and taste via a series of Schreiner organs along the sides of the body to detect their prey. They feed opportunistically on polychete worms, eggs, and carrion. Their primary predators are harbor seals, sablefish, and humans, which they avoid by producing large amounts of slime and tying themselves in knots.

There is little information on hagfish reproduction. Adults are thought to transition between sexes depending on the local ratio of males to females; adults with both sets of reproductive organs have also been recorded. They tend to reproduce every 2-3 years, when females lay 20-30 eggs. After hatching, the juveniles are fully independent, and become mature when they reach 42 cm (17 in) in length.

Conservation status: According to the IUCN, the Pacific hagfish is Data Deficient. Due to its habitat, there is not enough information on the species to determine population size or trends. However, they are increasingly harvested by fisheries for human consumption, which is a concern given the low reproductive rate

Photos

Masakazu Suzuki

NOAA

hagfish bowl got fired!!!!

(also i like this angle too YAY)