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Some of the information is from Baidu
As we all know, the underwater world eats the weak and the strong, the big fish eat the small fish, and the small fish eat shrimp, but this rule will be broken after encountering it. Who is it?
It is the "fish doctor" on the bottom of the sea, the scientific name is the cleft lip fish.
The cleft lip fish is a small fish that lives in the Pacific and Indian Oceans, with a body length of about 10 cm, and its appearance is more distinctive: from the mouth to the tail fin, there is a gradually widening black band, and the blue and yellow are scattered on both sides of the band.
< image comes from the > of the Internet
The innate ability of the split-lip fish is to clean the parasites, dead skin, and broken flesh between the teeth for all kinds of "sick fish", so it must have the title of "fish doctor".
Since there are "fish doctors" on the seabed, there are naturally also "jianghu langzhong" who "grab business."
True and false "Fish Doctor" is not clear
A fish called the three-banded shield-toothed fish, which looks almost exactly like the split-lip fish, can you see the obvious difference between them? (Warm reminder: left three with shield toothed fish, right split lip fish)
< image comes from online >
Although the appearance is similar, the three-banded shield toothed fish is not the same as the clean fish, it is a parasitic predator species, like to rely on similar characteristics to the split lip fish, imitate the swimming posture of the split lip fish, pretend to be a split lip fish to avoid predator attacks, and take the opportunity to be a "jianghu langzhong" and "illegal medical practice".
The purpose of "illegal medical practice" in "Jianghu Langzhong" is not to "rescue" other fish like "fish doctors". Its purpose is to rely on the lines and swimming posture of the cleft lip fish to approach other fish, confuse them, and then "illegally practice medicine" and tear off a piece of meat with its mouth to escape.
In addition, the pattern of the three-banded shield-toothed owls is extremely confusing, and they have multiple color types like the split-lip fish, and the average fish cannot distinguish them, so it is also very simple to get started.
But generally only juvenile fish will be deceived by this three-belted shield-toothed fish, and some old-fashioned fish or fish that have suffered losses will learn to distinguish between three-banded shield-toothed fish and clean fish, but sometimes fish bitten by three-banded shield-toothed fish will become sensitive, and even fish doctors will attack.
In this way, the three-banded shield-toothed fish and the split-lip fish should be natural enemies, but it just so happens that the three-banded shield-toothed fish finally have to find the split-lip fish to clean...
I don't know if there will be fish in the "medical hall" who will recognize them wrongly, but as mentioned earlier, some fish can distinguish between the two of them, so how can this be distinguished?
In fact, there are several more obvious differences between the three-banded shield-toothed wren and the split-lip fish:
First, the three-banded shield tooth wren mouth is in the lower position, which is convenient for nibbling on tissue, and there are two canine teeth inside for self-defense, while the split lip fish mouth is in the front position, which is convenient for cleaning for other fish.
The stripes of the three-banded shield-toothed owls are in order of dark-light-dark in the head color from top to bottom, while the split-lip fish has no color difference.
The three-banded shield-toothed wren has an extra-long dorsal fin that runs from behind the gill cover to the end of the tail stalk, while the dorsal fin of the split-lipped fish starts relatively behind.
Fourth, three-banded shield teeth The wren prefers to stay in the hole than the split-lip fish, and will drill some small holes that the split-lip fish can't see at all.
(Split-lip fish above, three-banded shield-toothed fish below)
Although the "jianghu langzhong" always likes to swindle and deceive, it cannot shake the special status of the split-lip fish on the seabed.
A special presence on the seabed
On the seabed, the split-lip fish is a very special existence, every day it serves about 2,000 "customers", these "customers" are particularly wide, from gentle small fish, but also vicious grouper, bean spot naked eel.....
Although the types of "customers" are different, they all have one thing in common: they are both extremely gentle with the cleft lip fish, because they need the cleft lip fish to help clean the dead skin and parasites on the surface of the body and in the mouth cavity. Even the huge and fierce shark obediently opened its mouth in front of it, waiting for the "diagnosis and treatment" of the split-lip fish. This interesting "doctor-patient" relationship happens to be recorded by "Underwater China" in the fourth episode of "The Secret Garden", and if you are interested, you can watch it
But, as we all know, in the seabed, when the big fish encounter fish smaller than themselves, they will not hesitate to swallow it, which is the rule of seabed survival. And the volume of the split-lip fish is almost smaller than that of all "customers", why would the "customers" prefer to break the rules of the seabed rather than eat it?
Is it because the split-lip fish is too small to eat? This is one reason, but the main reason why cleft lip fish can survive on the seabed is mutual.
Harmonious doctor-patient relationship
Larger fish need it to clean up the parasites more than they eat the cleft lip fish. Because if the parasites are not removed in time, for a long time to come, the big fish will be affected at all times, so serious that they hinder predation, reproduction, and even avoid natural enemies, and if they eat the cleft lip fish, the big fish will not be helped, which will affect their later lives, and even threaten their lives.
Since the big fish need the cleft lip fish to remove parasites and dead skin, so do not eat the split lip fish, then the same, the split lip fish in order to survive under the big fish mouth, will also do their best to serve the "customer", by the way, while serving, the parasite and dead skin as food.
It is precisely by maintaining this intergenerational relationship that the big fish and the split-lip fish can live in peace. At the same time, there are two special places about split-lip fish.
A cleft-lipped fish will degenerate
In the population of split-lip fish, the role of the leader is played by one of the largest males. With the leader as the center, there will be 3 to 6 female fish around it. If the male leader is lost, the sexual reversal will occur after it disappears: the largest female will take the same aggressive behavior as the male fish for 1 to 2 hours after the male disappears, and after a few hours, the largest female will completely replace the leader; after 2 to 4 days, the new leader will become a male.
The cleft lip fish is self-aware
In 2018, a collaborative study between Japan and Germany found that split-lip fish can recognize themselves in the mirror. This is the first time fish has been found to have this ability that only a few animals, such as chimpanzees, elephants, dolphins and crows, have.
The relevant research results have been published in the American journal Science Public Library Biology.
The existence of the split-lip fish has allowed us to see a more colorful underwater world, and has also changed our stereotyped understanding of the seabed. It turns out that not all big fish in the underwater world eat small fish; there are "doctors" on the bottom of the sea; there are also "jianghu langzhong" on the bottom of the sea; underwater creatures will "see a doctor"; not all fish have only seven seconds of memory. In the future, looking at the braised fish on the plate, will you think about it more, perhaps it was once a "patient" of split lip fish.
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