Hagfish are just over talked sea life creature and their intensive repulsive defense has provide them a proper place in both todays world and including pure imaginative world. These are just old eel like fishes and commonly known for their ability to produce slime when they got threatened. The slime is natural defense for them which helps them to escape from any predator. In this study we will just explore the world of hagfish, with their slippery trail, slime production abilities and their overall impact.
Mysterious World of Hagfish
Mostly they are called slime eels and belongs to jawless group of fishes which is existed for over million of years. This is among of one of the oldest creatures and they just adapted the life in deep waters. They are just feeding themselves from the remains of dead or from mammals and other creatures. They don’t have jaws to pull out the flesh into pieces, their specialized tooth structures helps them to latch onto carcasses and in tearing the chunks of meat. After feeding they just left only bones. That’s why they got reputation in ocean as garbage eaters.
Its not just famous of their eating habits, they got familiarity because of slime production abilities. Slime makes them slippery and helps them to evade predators by turning themselves slippery. Special mucous gland along their body helps them to generate enough slime for protection. The slime spreads and take a special form just like small slippery fibers after contacting with water.
Hagfish can produce a litter of slime in few seconds just after got threatened. This create a very sticky and barrier around that is just unbreakable, and making predators suffocating and causing them to retreat. Their are two glands, one produces mucous proteins and other generate long threadlike fibers. Once its outbreak, the fibrous threads entangle and form heavy sticky layer, this cost everything quickly including predator.
The slime is real strong and even can be nightmare for commercial fisherman. Their slime can coat the entire haul with messy thick coating. This just not make the catch difficult but can result in losses and can make the whole haul just unsellable. However, hagfish helps in breaking down of decaying organic matter and recycling the nutrients back into the ecosystem which is important for whole system.
Now a days, many researchers is carrying studies on hagfish slime in many fields including medical science. With slime capabilities in coatings and biodegradation of plastics, it sparked out the interest of many. Their slime could be dangerous but they play vital role in ecosystem. Whether you find it interesting , innovative or not- there is no deny in accepting the slimy trail of hagfish.
