Ray-Finned Fishes
Hydrodynamic aquatic rulers with lateral line pressure sensors, swim bladders, and electrical weaponry.
Actinopterygii & Sarcopterygii
Bony fishes represent the most diverse vertebrate group on the planet. Maneuvering via ray-supported fins and neutrally buoyant swim bladders, they inhabit everything from high-altitude mountain streams to abyssal ocean trenches past 8,000 meters deep.
Key Evolutionary Adaptations
Lateral line sensory systems detect water displacement and pressure waves from surrounding swimming creatures.
Electric eels align 6,000 electrocyte cells in series to discharge predatory shocks up to 860 volts.
Coelacanths possess fleshy lobed fins containing internal bone structures ancestral to all four-legged land animals.
Ray-Finned Fishes (page 3 of 3)
Thorny Seahorse
A seahorse with extremely sharp spines, a crown on its head and fathers that carry the babies.
Volta Electric Eel
The biological super-battery that hit 860 volts, the strongest electric discharge known from any living animal.
Wels Catfish
Europe's largest freshwater fish, and on one French river, a hunter that beaches itself to grab pigeons off a gravel island.
White-Spotted Pufferfish
A 12-centimeter pufferfish that spends 7 to 9 days digging a sand circle about 2 meters wide to impress a date.
Yellowfin Tuna
A warm-muscled torpedo that can swim across an entire ocean.