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Animal Crossing Fish - Explained #147

Brought to you by a marine biologist with this prickly boi...

CLICK HERE FOR THE AC FISH EXPLAINED MASTERPOST!

Fish come in every size, shape, and color under the sun. With over 30,000 species and counting, the group we accept as the “fish” (vertebrates with gills and no feet, usually) is the most numerous and diverse of the vertebrates. Fish are present in every watery habitat in the world, and so, they’ve had to come up with all sorts of ways to survive. There’s competition everywhere in the ocean, and also predators! But, we’ve talked about this before - every advantage comes with a cost; you can’t have everything! Today’s fish really exemplifies this by basically being the tiny turtle of the bunch. Meet the pineapple fish!

Another AC Pocket Camp friend, this one appeared in August and you can still fish for it at Saltwater Shores.

Now...is there any confusion as to why this thing is called a Pineapple fish? No? Good. It’s obvious with the yellow body scutes outlined in black. Pineapple fish are actually quite unique. They belong to a strange group of fish that mostly live in deep water or are nocturnal. These are the Trachichthyiformes. Within this Order is the Family Monocentridae, the pinecone fishes. There are only four species in this family, and they all kind of look like our friend from Pocket Camp, so it was a little annoying trying to figure out which one this could be. There is a fish called just “pineapple fish”, but there is also the Japanese Pineapple Fish (Monocentris japonica), which is what I’m going with here. In Japan, the Japanese Pineapple is also called “pinecone fish” or matsukasa, the latter of which is the name used in the Japanese version of Pocket Camp.

By Fernando Losada Rodríguez - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2000079

These fish are mostly nocturnal, coming out from their little hideaways in caves or under ledges to prey upon shrimp and other small invertebrates. There are two really interesting things about these, and other pinecone/pineapple, fish. First is the bright photophores on their lower jaw that no one knows the purpose of. Since they live in shallow water in coral reefs, but only come out at night, it’s speculated they may use the photophores like flashlights when they look for prey. Unfortunately, having a bright beacon, no matter what the purpose, is going to attract predators. This is where the pinecone fish get their namesake and the second really cool thing about them: those scutes.

See, these fish don’t have traditional scales, they have scutes, these really hard, spiky plates covering their bodies. These scutes make them a lot more durable towards damage, like getting bitten by predators. Coupled with the little, sharp spike on each scute, predators may just pass this little fish by for an easier-to-swallow meal. However, remember when I said every advantage comes with a cost? The cost for the pineapple fish is that with those heavy, sturdy scutes, it’s a pretty weak swimmer. Yes...it’s a fish that can’t swim that great. Well, that’s life!

And there you have it. Fascinating stuff, no?

#pinecone fish #pineapple fish #fish #animal crossing #animal crossing pocket camp #marine biology #animals #marine life #animal crossing fish explained #science in video games

Pineapple fish [also known as pinecone fish, Monocentris japonica] kept at the Long Beach Aquarium. These fish are native to Indo-Pacific coral reefs. Images by Joseph Dougherty.

#pineapple fish #pinecone fish #fish #animals #nature #aquatic