Myxine glutinosa

Myxine glutinosa, known as the Atlantic hagfish in North America, and often simply as the hagfish in Europe, is a species of jawless fish of the genus Myxine.

Myxine glutinosa
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Myxini
Order: Myxiniformes
Family: Myxinidae
Genus: Myxine
Species:
M. glutinosa
Binomial name
Myxine glutinosa
Synonyms[1][2]
  • Gasterobranchus glutinosus (Linnaeus, 1758)
  • Gastrobranchus coecus Bloch, 1791
  • ?Myxine glutinosa var. septentrionalis Putnam, 1874
  • Myxine glutinosa var. limosa Putnam, 1874
  • Myxine glutinosa var. australis Putnam, 1874
  • Myzinus glutinosus (Linnaeus, 1758)
  • Petromyzon myxine Walbaum, 1792

Distribution

The distribution of Myxine glutinosa in the eastern Atlantic Ocean extends from the western Mediterranean Sea and Portugal to the North Sea, Skagerrak, Kattegat and the Varanger Fjord.[3] It is also found in the western Atlantic Ocean from Baffin Island, Canada south to North Carolina.[4] A related species, the Gulf hagfish (Eptatretus springeri), occurs in the Gulf of Mexico.[5]

Description

The Atlantic hagfish may grow up to 2.5 feet (0.76 m) long, with no eyes and no jaws; its star-shaped mouth is surrounded by 6 barbels.[4] There is a single gill slit on each side of the eel-like body.[4] It has a total of 88–102 pores from which it can exude a slimy mucus.[3] Hagfish have very flexible bodies which allow them to manipulate themselves into knots.The knots created by the hagfish remove mucous from the body, allow them to escape tight spaces, pull potential prey from burrows, and because they have no opposable jaws it helps create leverage while they eat.[6]

Ecology

Hagfish such as M. glutinosa feed on the carcasses of fishes, which they bore into through any available opening.[3][4]

Trivia

Following an unofficial poll by the NRK P1 broadcaster in 1982, the hagfish was voted the national fish of Norway with over 4 000 votes, beating the second place (Atlantic Cod) by a large margin, as that fish only got 2,552 votes. However, the vote was most likely rigged and the result was overturned by the jury.[7]

References
  1. Froese, R.; Pauly, D. (2017). "Myxinidae". FishBase version (02/2017). Retrieved 18 May 2017.
  2. Van Der Laan, Richard; Eschmeyer, William N.; Fricke, Ronald (11 November 2014). "Family-group names of Recent fishes". Zootaxa. 3882 (1): 1–230. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.3882.1.1. PMID 25543675.
  3. P. J. P. Whitehead; M.-L. Bauchot; J.-C. Hureau; J. Nielsen; E. Tortonese, eds. (1984/1986). "Hagfish (Myxine glutinosa)". Fishes of the NE Atlantic and the Mediterranean. Check date values in: |date= (help)
  4. Michael Filisky & Roger Tory Peterson (1998). "Atlantic Hagfish". Peterson First Guide to Fishes of North America (2nd ed.). Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. p. 10. ISBN 978-0-395-91179-2.
  5. Edwin S. Iversen & Renate H. Skinner (2006). "Atlantic hagfish Myxine glutinosa". Dangerous Sea Life of the West Atlantic, Caribbean, and Gulf of Mexico: A Guide for Accident Prevention and First Aid. Pineapple Press. p. 72. ISBN 978-1-56164-370-7.
  6. Haney, W. A., Clark, A. J., & Uyeno, T. A. (2019). Characterization of body knotting behavior used for escape in a diversity of hagfishes. Journal of Zoology. doi: 10.1111/jzo.12752
  7. Friis, R. (1982): «Slimåler» raser mot NRK/torsken, VG, s. 33, 15. November 1982

Haney, W. A., Clark, A. J., & Uyeno, T. A. (2019). Characterization of body knotting behavior used for escape in a diversity of hagfishes. Journal of Zoology. doi: 10.1111/jzo.12752

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