Ok next up is the #5 Vampire Squid at the #1 Saber Toothed Anchovy #2021MMM
The squid arrived here after escaping from the basket star and the black dragonfish while the anchovy ignored the copepod and eviscerated the pink vent fish #2021MMM
Tonight's battle takes place in the warm shallow waters off of what would one day become Pakistan, and the sabretooth anchovy is on patrol #2021MMM
(or so we assume, we don't have full skeletons for these fish so we can only guess at their post-cranial bodies #2021MMM)
Magically transported (yes, looking at you YETI CRAB) back 54 million years, the Vampire Squid is in a new world #2021MMM
For all of its life, the Vampire Squid has wrapped itself in the deep see. The coldness & darkness are its shroud and its world, and now those are gone #2021MMM
Vampire Squid is in a world with new smells, new warmth & new life. And to you & me who are surface dwellers that may sound lovely to the vampire squid they are horrifying #2021MMM
The brightness is painful, as Vampire Squids have the proportionally largest eyes, the 6" long creature has 1" eyes #2021MMM
Temporarily blinded the vampire squid flails around, but because its body has spent its whole life at depth the change in pressure is causing bigger problems #2021MMM
(this is such a big problem that @calacademy scientists including @CoralReefFish had to create a mini pressure chamber to allow them to bring back deep sea fish) frontiersin.org/articles/10.33… #2021MMM)
So blinded, and feeling its body rapidly depressurizing the vampire squid is having a rough day, the only saving grace is that recent rains have made the shallow sea quite murky #2021MMM
The sabretooth anchovy has large eyes and we assume was a visually oriented predator and now it's seeing a whole lot of nothing #2021MMM
The anchovy is a member of Clupeiformes an order of fishes that are united by having their air bladder connected to their mouth, which allows them to burp their way to optimal buoyancy #2021MMM
And as noted in the species description, they possess an otophysic connection (Capobianco et al. 2020 bit.ly/2QsuvT4) which means that part of this gas bladder goes inside their skull #2021MMM
Where does it go? This section of the air bladder goes right up near the ears, and we think that it uses the gas bladder as a giant subwoofer collecting and magnifying low level sounds up to ultrasound at 100,000 Hz (Putland et al. 2019 bit.ly/39alch2) #2021MMM
Ultrasound noises like those made by thrashing prey.... #2021MMM
The sabretooth anchovy is able to locate the source of the vibration and glides closer, while the squid blinded and in pain from its organs expanding with no support is wracked in pain #2021MMM
In the end, the inevitable attack is really an act of mercy as the sabretooth anchovy uses its eponymous dentation to full extent #2021MMM
The murky brown water takes on a sheen of red and a silver flash of scales is the only evidence left... #2021MMM
SABRETOOTH ANCHOVY DEFEATS VAMPIRE SQUID!!! #2021MMM
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