A Cowfish's Journey

The story of a juvenile cowfish that was found off the coast of Nova Scotia. This species is native to the subtropical waters off Florida and the Bahamas, where it lives on the bottom in eelgrass beds eating small invertebrates and marine plants. This fish likely travelled north as an egg with the warm waters of the Gulf Stream or a late summer storm. One unique thing about cowfish is that they are covered in bony plates formed by enlarged, thickened scales. They get their name from the horn-like scales above their eyes similar to cows. Unfortunately, the temperate waters here will be too cold for this tropical fish as winter comes and the waters cool.


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For more information check out the sources used to make this video:

Carpenter, K.E.; Niem, V.H. (eds) 2001. FAO species identification guide for fishery purposes. The living marine resources of the Western Central Pacific. Volume 6. Bony fishes part 4 (Labridae to Latimeriidae), estuarine crocodiles, sea turtles, sea snakes and marine mammals. FAO. Rome. pp. 3381-4218. http://www.fao.org/tempref/docrep/fao...[0,{%22name%22:%22FitH%22},800]

Curran, M.C. 1989. Occurrence of tropical fishes in New England Waters. Diving for Science. pp. 71-82. http://dspace.rubicon-foundation.org/...

Matsuura, K. 2015. Taxonomy and systematics of tetraodontiform fishes: a review focusing primarily on progress in the period from 1980 to 2014. Ichthyological Research 62(1). pp. 72-113. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10228-014-04...

Schmidt, R.E., and R. Lake, T.R. 2001. A Benthic Juvenile Scrawled Cowfish (Acanthostracion quadricornis) from the Lower Hudson River Estuary. Northeastern Naturalist, 8(3), pp. 343-346. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3858491

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