28-03-2025
Aussies amazed by adorable video of extremely rare species: 'Very cute'
Adorable footage of one of the world's rarest and most unusual ocean creatures has left thousands of Aussies swooning. In the short clip, two tiny red handfish — a critically endangered type of angler fish only found in Tasmania — can be seen using their distinctive fins to walk across grains of sand.
After coming face-to-face, the roughly two-centimetre juveniles appear to greet each other by waving the long filaments sprouting from their heads, otherwise known as an illicium.
However, that's not entirely the case, Dr Andrew Trotter, a senior research fellow at the University of Tasmania's Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies (IMAS), told Yahoo News Australia on Friday.
'They're essentially fighting over a cookie,' he said, explaining that a small isopod was lingering in-between the 'very cute' red handfish, which are part of a captive breeding program aimed at bringing the species back from the brink of extinction. The pair have a short standoff before the one on the left scores the snack.
The juveniles seen in the video, which has been viewed almost 100,000 times, are part of a group of 232 hatchlings born late last year.
With only an estimated 70 to 100 red handfish surviving in the wild in two reef locations near Hobart, the IMAS, working with the Foundation for Australia's Most Endangered Species (FAME), have vowed not to let the species disappear despite the continued threats of pollution, climate change, a booming native sea urchin population and loss in vital seagrasses, on which they lay their eggs.
Of the 232 red handfish that hatched in December, Trotter said a few have sadly died, but the 97 per cent remaining are expected to be released sometime in October.
'We're over the moon with how they've survived this time,' the expert says, adding a few even have 'stand out personalities'. 'One we've got is a really spotty red handfish and he's got real attitude,' he laughed.
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The group of juveniles are now undergoing conditioning so they not only survive, but thrive in the wild and reproduce on their own. The appropriately nicknamed 'handfish school' involves phases of introducing other animals and live macro algae, 'rather than just exposing them straight to all the microorganisms that are in the environment'.
Trotter said everyone involved in the conservation project is 'hopeful' the hatchlings will survive and make it maturity, which takes three years, but an ideal habitat is key.
'We've got issues with habitat loss at both of the sites that we're concentrating on — the historical sites — so we need to make sure that they go out fit and robust and well equipped,' he told Yahoo.
'But obviously [we have to] make sure that the habitat out there is appropriate, and we're working on putting seagrass back at the sites, because we know that seagrass is an important part of the habitat, and that we've lost quite a lot of it at both of the sites.'
Researchers are also looking for reefs that have similar conditions as alternative sites for translocation.
'We want to have our eggs in more than two baskets. We're not going to go back to those historical sites where they're locally extinct because we think there's a good reason why those sites are not as good, and want the sites to be more similar to the two sites where they've persisted for millennia.'
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