Creature Feature – Ocean Sunfish
This week is the letter ‘O’, and today’s featured creature is the Ocean Sunfish.
The Ocean Sunfish, or common mola mola, are the heaviest of all bony fish! The family comprises four other species, however the common mola mola is the most abundant and widespread.
Taxonomy
Scientific Name: Mola mola
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Order: Tetradontiformes
Family: Molidae
Genus: Mola
Ocean Sunfish Fact File
Size: They can grow up to a huge 3.4m in length. They can weigh up to 2.5 tonnes
Distribution: This species is found worldwide, in temperate and tropical oceans
Diet: Sunfish are generalist predators that consume largely small fishes, fish larvae, squid, and crustaceans. They also eat sea jellies and salps (marine invertebrates)
Behaviour: Sunfish develop their shape because the back fin which they are born with simply never grows. Instead, it folds into itself as they mature, creating a rounded rudder called a clavus. Like other marine species, they cope with parasites by inviting other species to clean them. In the sunfish’s case, it is seabirds they rely on
IUCN Status: Vulnerable. Decreasing populations are thought to primarily caused by being caught in drift gill nets. For example, 70-90% of the catch in the Mediterranean swordfish industry is thought to be comprised of mola mola. In addition, they can suffocate on sea trash, like plastic bags, which resemble jellyfish
