29 October 2009

Painfully Adorable Sea Dragons

BBC has filmed Sea Dragons, which are basically like seahorses, during their courting dance and subsequent babies' births offshore of Australia.



The dance is only so strange because of the way the sea dragons look; we have all seen schools of fish mirroring each others movements, so it doesnt seem like too rare of an occurrence. Probably involves sensing water movements with their lateral line. ANYWAY, the baby sea dragons are where it's actually at, super cute, with their little eyes in the eggs and then after they're born... Reminds me of when my dad's fish were breeding and there were all these little babies that were basically a pair of giant eyes with a little tail attached, hanging out in the plants and miraculously not getting eaten. I'm just glad my fish don't breed, because anything that fits in a goldfish's mouth will not last very long.

All that said, I guess I didnt really realize that seahorses were fish, since they sort of look like a cross between a starfish and a fish, maybe, even though that makes absolutely no sense. I guess the seahorses don't need much in the way of a fuller more fish-like body as they have adapted to sort of hang out instead of swimming around and don't need all those extra muscles.

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