Photo by Garry McCarthy<\/figcaption><\/figure>\nWhile I am enjoying myself on my much needed vacation (at least I hope I am enjoying myself) we are going to learn another interesting fact about a crazy ocean fish.\u00a0 If you are anything like me then you may be familiar with the freshwater sunfish, which is a small fish that have provided children hours and hours of entertainment.\u00a0 If this is your idea of a sunfish then today’s fact should impress you.\u00a0 The Ocean Sunfish isn’t related to the freshwater kind.<\/p>\n
By looking at the picture you will see one of the biggest differences between these two species of fish.\u00a0 The freshwater sunfish that I am use to seeing in Ontario are about 9 inches long and weigh less than a pound.\u00a0 On the other side of the proverbial coin is the Ocean Sunfish (also known as the Mola mola<\/em>) which can be as long as 14 feet and weigh about 5000 pounds. Imagine your kids face when they are sitting on the dock at your cottage and they pull up a 5000 pound sunfish! Just to put that into perspective, that is about the weight of a small pickup truck.<\/p>\nAs you can understand, the ocean sunfish is the largest bony fish on the planet.\u00a0 Fish such as sharks and rays are cartilaginous fish so they don’t count.\u00a0 Interestingly enough the Mola mola<\/em> can be as tall as they are long which gives them a rather circular appearance.\u00a0 This gigantic fish feed mainly on jellyfish but will also feed on small fish and microscopic plant matter floating around in the water.\u00a0 Unfortunately, the ocean sunfish has a small mouth, which is odd considering the size of the animal.\u00a0 In order to feed with this beak-like mouth the Mola mola<\/em> will actually suck the food in and then it spit out over and over again.\u00a0 This allows the large sunfish to tear apart its food so it can easily eat the smaller pieces.\u00a0 That might be gross but you have to admit, that is pretty clever.\u00a0 Just for fun, the next time you are on a date, I want you to try this feeding technique.\u00a0 Let me know how long the date lasts!<\/p>\nOcean Sunfish Fast Fact:<\/strong> When this sunfish first hatches it is about one-tenth of an inch long.\u00a0 Now I want you to think about this for a second. This is a fish that can end up being 14 feet long and starts out smaller than an inch.\u00a0 Impressive!\u00a0 Even more impressive is the fact that the Mola mola<\/em> will weigh 60 million times more as an adult then it did when it was born.\u00a0 Just so you know, most of us don’t even weigh 30 times more than we did when we were born! If I were a Ocean Sunfish I would weigh about 540 million pounds right now. Don’t you just hate that extra holiday weight! Well I am off to call Weight Watchers so have a good one!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While I am enjoying myself on my much needed vacation (at least I hope I am enjoying myself) we are going to learn another interesting fact about a crazy ocean fish.\u00a0 If you are anything like me then you may be familiar with the freshwater sunfish, which is a small fish that have provided children hours and hours of entertainment.\u00a0 If this is your idea of a sunfish then today’s fact should impress you.\u00a0 The Ocean Sunfish isn’t related to the freshwater kind. By looking at the picture you will see one of the biggest differences between these two species <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1798,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[64,4024],"tags":[348,4029,4028,459,4116,451,457,456,455,4025,458],"yoast_head":"\n
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