I like frogfish because they are weird looking creature. Their bodies are small and stocky. They have loose prickly skin, limb-like pectoral fins with an elbow-like joint (which looks like hands!!), small round gill openings behind the fins, very large upward directed mouth.
Look how it uses its fins to grab hold of the sponge. Photo by Lan.
The frogfish is a master of camouflage. His body is often covered with spots, stripes, warts, skin flaps and filaments. The frogfish mimics substrate and structures like algae covered rocks or rubble, plants like sargassum weed or algae, and animals like tunicates, corals and sponges. Some species can be of many different colors , from black to red, orange, yellow, browns, white, purple, green, some even have patches of blue. The colors usually help them blend into their environment such as sponges, corals or algae.
Frogfish don't swim very often; most of them lack a swim bladder (except the Sargassum frogfish (Histrio histrio ). To cross small distances the frogfish may walk or actually gallop (I’ve seen this before and its really cute). Check out this video of frogfish walking.
It can also move very quickly by sucking in large quantities of water through the mouth and forcing it out through the tiny gill openings. This results in a jet-like very fast forward propulsion a few centimeters above the ground.
They are kinda like a fisherman. They fish for their food. First dorsal spine is modified into a moveable fishing rod or luring apparatus (illicium) tipped with a lure or bait (esca). The rod or stalk comes in different lengths and is sometimes striped. The shape of the lure is one of the main distinguishing marks. The lure often but not always mimics a small animal. The lures can be in a shape of a worm, a shrimp or even like a small fish with eye-spot and appendages resembling fins. While using the lure the frogfish even imitates the way which that particular animal would move. This strategy to catch prey is called aggressive mimicry.
Frogfishes mainly eat fishes and crustaceans (shrimps and crabs). They can swallow items of prey that are twice as large as them.
Of course not all prey is attracted by the lure. A more passive approach is the excellent camouflage of the frogfishes. Many animals just mistake a frogfish for a sponge, come too close and are swallowed. I have actually seen on various occasions, how small gobies flittered over the body of a frogfish sitting in a sponge, without being aware of the danger of getting swallowed.
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