A "furry" ghost fish has been found on the Great Barrier Reef
Scientists have described a new species of unusual ghost fish on coral reefs off Australia. It is bright orange or reddish, with a long snout and many thin growths on its body that make it appear "furry". The new species is named Solenostomus snuffleupagus, after Mr Snufflepagus from Sesame Street.
The fish doesn't actually have fur. Its "shagginess" is the long skin filaments that help the animal blend in with algae, coral and other reef details. Because of this camouflage, the fish was mistaken for many years for an already known species, the rough ghost fish Solenostomus paegnius.
The discovery was published in the Journal of Fish Biology. The authors confirmed the new species not only by appearance, but also by DNA, skeletal structure and museum specimens.
Details
Ghost fish are close relatives of seahorses and sea dragons. They are good at camouflage: they adapt to their surroundings, almost blend into the background and can look like algae or soft coral. Therefore, even experienced divers and biologists can be difficult to distinguish one species from another.
The new species has been "hiding in plain sight" for a long time. It was filmed by divers and underwater photographers, photos appeared on social media and citizen science platforms like iNaturalist. But most people thought they were seeing a familiar "shaggy" ghost fish.
Marine biologist David Haraszti and researcher Graham Short pointed out that these fish are still different from similar species. They compared photographs, museum specimens, body shape and fin shape, and then tested the specimens using modern techniques.
Genetic analysis showed a marked difference: the mitochondrial DNA of the new species differed from that of a closely related species by about 22 per cent. For this kind of research, this is a strong argument that the scientists are facing a truly distinct species and not just an unusual colouration of an already known fish.
Scientists also used micro-CT - scanning, which allows you to get a detailed 3D model of the skeleton. So it turned out that Solenostomus snuffleupagus has 36 vertebrae, while in close species usually 32-34. In addition, in the skin of the fish found characteristic star-shaped bone structures.
Compared to its relatives, the new ghost fish looks more compact and "stocky". The size of the described specimens is small: the scientific paper specifies specimens with a length of about 18-34 mm, excluding the caudal fin.
Why it's important
At first glance, this is just fun news about a fish that looks like a character in a children's show. But for biologists, such findings are important: they show that even well-studied reefs still hide unknown species.
The Great Barrier Reef and neighbouring areas have long been explored by scientists, divers and photographers. But small, well-camouflaged animals can go undetected or listed under an alien name for decades. In the case of Solenostomus snuffleupagus, a combination of conventional observation, museum collections, DNA analysis and 3D scanning helped.
Such work also helps to understand reef biodiversity more accurately. This is important against a backdrop of climate change, ocean warming and the degradation of coral ecosystems: to protect species, they must first be correctly described and distinguished from similar ones.
Background
Ghost fish are small marine fishes from the tropical waters of the Indo-Pacific region. They are often found near coral, seaweed, seagrasses, and other hiding places. They do not appear to be fast predators: they usually stay among shelters and rely on camouflage.
A new species has been described from the southwest Pacific Ocean. The scientific description is based on specimens from the Coral Sea off Queensland, Australia, but known observations indicate that similar fish have been found more widely - including off Papua New Guinea.
The name snuffleupagus was chosen because of its external resemblance to Mr Snufflepagus, the big shaggy character from Sesame Street. This is an unusual but understandable move for a scientific name: the fish's appearance was indeed one of the main features by which it was noticed.
Source
Graham Short et al, "Solenostomus snuffleupagus snuffleupagus sp. nov., a hairy ghost pipefish (Teleostei: Solenostomidae) from the Southwest Pacific, with an integrative comparison to S. paegnius", Journal of Fish Biology, 2026.
In the study, the authors described a new species of ghost fish from specimens from coral reefs in the Coral Sea off Queensland. They used several methods at once for verification: comparison of external structure, mitochondrial DNA, museum specimens and micro-CT scans of the skeleton. The main differences between the new species are dense long skin filaments, a more compact body, 36 vertebrae and a marked genetic difference from the similar species Solenostomus paegnius.