Why is this animal unusual?
The “fishing rod” is a fin spine that moved to the forehead and grew a pocket of glowing bacteria on its tip. The anglerfish wiggles it like bait. When something comes to investigate, the jaws snap shut in a flash.
Why does it look like that?
Food is rare in the deep, so an anglerfish is built never to miss a meal: a huge mouth, long teeth that fold inward and a stomach that stretches like a balloon. Some can swallow prey twice their own size.
Strangest biological feature
The lure. Only females have one, and each species has its own shape – a bit like a glowing name tag in the dark.
Why is it strange?
In some species the tiny male bites a female and never lets go. His body fuses with hers, their bloodstreams join and he shrinks into little more than a lump that makes sperm. One female can carry several males at once.
Interesting behavioral facts
Anglerfish barely swim. They hang motionless in the dark to save energy and let the lure do the work. Males have no lure at all – just enormous nostrils for sniffing out a female across the blackness.
Records held
The male of one species, Photocorynus spiniceps, is fully grown at about 0.2 in (6 mm) – one of the smallest backboned animals ever found. A living mated pair was first filmed only in 2016.
