Rare Albino Ratfish With Eerie, Silvery Sheen Caught Off Washington Coast; 'It Must Have Been Like A Beacon'

Rare Albino Ratfish With Eerie, Silvery Sheen Caught Off Washington Coast; 'It Must Have Been Like A Beacon'

Source: Underwatertimes

9/24/2007

Rare Albino Ratfish With Eerie, Silvery Sheen Caught Off Washington Coast; 'It Must Have Been Like A Beacon'

Washington -- A ghostly, mutant ratfish caught off Whidbey Island in Washington state is the only completely albino fish ever seen by both the curator of the University of Washington's 7.2 million-specimen fish collection and a fish and wildlife biologist with more than 20 years of sampling fish in Puget Sound.

"Ratfish usually hang out in places with soft, muddy bottoms," says Jon Reum, the aquatic and fishery sciences doctoral student who found the albino ratfish during a UW research project. "The typical ratfish in Puget Sound is brown or black with a smattering of white spots so it blends in with the sediments."

This fish was almost pure white with a crystalline layer near the surface of its skin that gave it a silvery sheen.

"It must have been like a beacon," says Ted Pietsch, UW professor of fisheries and aquatic sciences and curator of the UW fish collection. "Why didn't it get eaten, long before this, by some predator, for example, by a spiny dogfish so common in Puget Sound and that love to devour ratfish""

The foot-long female may have been 2 or 3 years old, Reum and Pietsch estimate, making her a teenager in the ratfish world.

She was caught this summer in about 200 feet of water during a UW research project examining the food web in Hood Canal and Puget Sound. Puget Sound is the nation's second-largest estuary in the Lower 48 after Chesapeake Bay. The city of Seattle, home to about 4 million people, is built on its shores. Puget Sound connects to the Pacific Ocean via the Strait of Juan de Fuca to the north.

Continue...

News Id		Source	Stamp	country
2001	Massive 560-Pound Swordfish Caught Off North Carolina By 13-Year-Old Youngster	sportfishingmag	2023-01-12	US
2002	Japanese snow monkeys have learned to fish for food	earth	2023-01-13	JP
2003	‘Man against fish’: Cornwall could soon be selling the chance to catch tuna	ft	2023-01-13	CU
2004	Salmon deaths on Scotland’s fish farms double – but are jellyfish to blame?	theguardian	2023-01-15	UK
2005	Up close and personal: Dolphin POV caught on camera while hunting tasty fish	arstechnica	2023-01-01	US
2006	Diver in Santa Claus outfit collects plastic fish	hurriyetdailynews	2023-01-02	TR
2007	Engineering the World's First Underwater WiFi	interestingengineering	2020-06-12	US
2008	Власти подготовят реформу рынка лосося	rbc	2023-01-26	RU
2009	Я стал зимним рыбаком	Охотники.ру	2023-01-18	RU
2010	BSA certified angler instructor extols the virtues of ice fishing	scoutingmagazine	2023-01-03	US
2011	Record-Sized Sturgeon Caught Near Stillwater	stcroix360	2023-01-02	US
2012	Indonesian coastal community embraces sustainable fishing challenge	eco-business	2023-01-06	ID
2013	Japanese exchange student successful with sturgeon his first time ice fishing	stcroix360	2023-01-06	US
2014	Fish ear bones, otoliths, teach scientists about marine life and seafood fraud	ABC Pilbara	2023-01-07	AU
2015	What you need to know to catch fish in Maine this month	bangordailynews	2023-01-07	ME
2016	Bottom trawlers venturing close to shore 'killing it' for recreational fishers	stuff	2023-01-02	NZ
2017	Maine’s plan for saving the Arctic charr in a Somerset County lake is illogical	bangordailynews	2023-01-03	US
2018	Mi’kmaq Farms to quadruple fish production with expansion in 2023	bangordailynews	2022-12-14	US
2019	Maine won’t see any large-scale fish farms open for years	bangordailynews	2023-01-02	US
2020	Puffer fish poison is 1200 times more deadly than cyanide	agupdate	2023-01-02	US
2021	Dokken: Minot angler catches pending North Dakota state record burbot	echopress	2023-01-12	US
2022	18-year-old angler on track to catch all 54 fish native to Minnesota	echopress	2023-01-15	US
2023	Duluth author compiles new bible for fly anglers	echopress	2023-01-20	US
2024	Good days or bad, Curt Quesnell tells it like it is on Lake of the Woods	echopress	2023-01-20	CA
2025	Quebec lake named top ice fishing destination in Canada	CTV News	2023-01-17	CA