Pearlfish; House Hunters Gone Wrong

     Imagine your dream home. What do you see? A mansion in Palm Springs, a waterfront apartment in Dubai, or maybe a rustic beach home? Well, it is true that the ocean offers some of the worlds finest real estate but today I will be talking about an animal that seems to be missing out. Meet the pearlfish. These tropical eel-like fish live in shallow waters all around the world but what makes them special is that, well, they live in the butts of sea cucumbers.

First of all, what is a sea cucumber? They are cucumber looking animals that live on the bottom of the seabed. They are related to sea urchins and sea stars, walk around with hundreds of tiny feet and either filter feed plankton, or eat nutrients that float down from high up (eg. poop). They don't really have a brain, breathe through their butts and have a very large rectum built for pooping out massive quantities of sand.

Now, Pearlfish love sea cucumbers. This is because they hunt at night and need a safe place to stay during the day. So, they swim to a sea cucumber trying to find the opening. They then sniff around a bit to make sure-don't even ask me, and then when the anus opens up so that the sea cucumber can breathe, they dash in. This is where they spend their day. Although they usually enjoy the comfort of the sea cucumber alone, sometimes they share their space. It is not too uncommon to find a sea cucumber with five pearlfish inside. Anyways, this concludes my post. Thank you and goodbye.