The Headbutting Contests of the Green Humphead Parrotfish

HD video of a headbutting contest between Green Humphead Parrotfish was recently taken by team of fishery biologists from NOAA's Beaufort Laboratory. The team was stunned to observe this behavior. “How could this dramatic aspect of its social and reproductive behavior have gone unnoticed.” The headbutting contests by the Parrotfish are the first of this type ever observed in marine fishes.

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Extraordinary Behavior in Green Humphead Parrotfish Discovered | Biology | Sci-News.com


PLoS ONE: Extraordinary Aggressive Behavior from the Giant Coral Reef Fish, Bolbometopon muricatum, in a Remote Marine Reserve

 

so cool!!! thanks for sharing!

 

Cool Video, amazing behavior... the only sucky part is to see the other diver grabbing on to the reef on the far right....

 

“How could this dramatic aspect of its social and reproductive behavior have gone unnoticed,” the researchers emphasize in the paper.

They propose two reasons: “i) low population densities resulting from overfishing dampen competition for resources (females or spawning territories) and/or disrupt the social system so that headbutting contests are uncommon and no longer advantageous; ii) headbutting contests are common, but negative responses to humans in exploited populations preclude observations of natural behavior.”

Bibliographic information: Muñoz RC, Zgliczynski BJ, Laughlin JL, Teer BZ. 2012. Extraordinary Aggressive Behavior from the Giant Coral Reef Fish, Bolbometopon muricatum, in a Remote Marine Reserve. PLoS-ONE 7(6): e38120. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0038120

Copied for those that did not read the article.

Oh to be the person that gets to sit on that perch and watch and document.

I believe a name change is in order " Sea Rams".

 

That is awesome! Total Sea Rams!