Damselfish in Distress Call Their Enemies
CBC Radio | Posted: November 13, 2015 8:41 PM | Last Updated: November 13, 2015
Defenceless fish provokes predators to fight over it to escape.
Damselfish are common to Australia's Great Barrier Reef. During the juvenile stage of their lives, they are naive to their many predators, and most do not make it to adulthood.
But a new study by Dr. Oona Lonnstedt, from the Department of Ecology and Genetics at Uppsala University in Sweden, has found that young damselfish deploy an innovative defence mechanism, when they are in the jaws of a predator.
They release a chemical into the water that attracts many other predators. In the ensuing frenzy over a potential meal, the captured damselfish is often able to escape to the shelter of the reef. In fact, the damsel's chemical escape plan has a 40-percent success rate.
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