And, flounders, soles, turbots, plaices and halibuts, of course, are much sought after as tasty food fishes. They all generally follow the same flatfish rules of body design. WHY ARE FLOUNDERS FLAT? 1: THE FLATFISH CONTINUUMįlounders are members of the flatfish order (Order Pleuronectiformes) that includes more than 800 species ranging in size from about two inches ( Tarphops oligolepis, a flounder found near Japan and Korea) to eight feet or more (Atlantic halibut, Hippoglossus hippoglossus, found in the North Atlantic). The long pectoral/dorsal fin on this suggests it’s a male, as opposed to the fish at top. More typically, this Peacock Flounder adds blue rosettes to its mimic of a sandy bottom. ![]() As part of the process, the eye on the lower side moves to join the other on the upper side.Īdd to this strange architecture a spectacular ability to manipulate color patterns and disappear into the background and you have amazingly singular fishes. Somehow, what starts out as a normal fish in the larval stage transitions from vertical, bi-lateral and opposite-eyed into a flat-as-a-pancake adult that swims, eats and hangs out on its side, one side always down, one always up. And Peacock Flounders obviously would have been from his Blue Period. But why are flounders flat? And how do they get flat? Matching the corals below, a highly colorized Peacock Flounder (Bothus lunatus) passes above the reef.įLOUNDERS ARE THE FISHES THAT PABLO PICASSO MIGHT HAVE DREAMED UP – all the parts are there, just arranged differently. As weird as this sounds, they’re highly successful survivors and predators. ![]() Flounders are famously fishes that start out with typical-fish body shapes and morph into bottom-dwelling flatfishes that live sideways, with both eyes on the same side.
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