Black Angler

• Its strike is the fastest documented in any fish: it opens its mouth and sucks in the prey in about six thousandths of a second, a movement impossible to see with the naked eye.
• It walks over the bottom on its pectoral and pelvic fins, which are modified into jointed, leg-like limbs.
• It can swallow prey twice its own size thanks to an extremely distensible stomach, and it is not unusual for it to devour another frogfish.
• The first dorsal spine is modified into a fishing rod, the illicium, tipped with a lure that mimics a small fish; if a predator tears it off, it regrows within a few months.
• Its huge protrusible mouth lets it swallow prey its own size by suction.
• It changes colour and pattern over a few weeks to match the bottom it lives on, so the same individual can look very different at different times of year.
• Juveniles are barely 2 or 3 mm long and already have the fishing rod and the suction mouth fully formed.

Habitat & environment

Reefs and sponge-covered bottoms of the Indo-Pacific, from 0 to 75 m

Sources consulted: https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antennarius_pictus