Fish that start with S are abundant and varied. While some are prized for their meat or sport fishing potential, others provide flavorful additions to dishes like bouillabaisse and cioppino.
This article will introduce some of the most impressive species, starting with S, no matter your aquarium experience level or where you stand on your fish-keeping journey.
Sailfish
The sailfish is one of the most iconic sea creatures, perhaps best known for its large dorsal fin resembling a sail. A popular sportfish, sailfish can be found worldwide and race alongside larger species such as marlins.
In addition to being a speedy swimmer, the sailfish is also an effective predator. It feeds on bony fishes and cephalopods such as squid and octopus for sustenance, most often near surface waters, midwater areas, and reef edges.
Sailfish possess long, sharp bills to stun and stab prey before consuming it. Their bill can also slash at its surface to gain a grip on an item more quickly. Sailfish can also change skin color to communicate among members of their species or with those they are hunting.
Sailfish can be found throughout Earth’s oceans, though they prefer colder pelagic regions over coastlines. Being highly mobile animals, sailfish will move between areas depending on weather and food availability.
Estimates show that sailfish can reach speeds up to 67mph in bursts, making it one of the fastest fish species in the ocean. While some wildlife bloggers may claim they can swim even faster, such claims tend to be unsubstantiated and largely unverifiable.
The sailfish’s denticles are uniquely arranged, helping it avoid “cavitation,” or slowdown caused by air bubbles that would otherwise slow its movement. Although scientists do not fully understand how these denticles function, they know they help it achieve high speeds without expending too much energy.
Sailfish are highly flexible fish that can be caught using many baits. Live bait works particularly well if targeting these sailfish in warmer waters in tropical regions; fresh mackerel makes an ideal bait choice in such instances, though smaller tuna, bonitos, or strip bait could also work well.
Seahorse
Seahorses are highly sought-after pets. Unfortunately, however, they require much attention and care to thrive. However, people still find these adorable pipe fishes fascinating, and they make great companions. When keeping seahorses as pets, it is important to remember they do not swim fast, and you will likely see them swimming slowly through their tank with their tails wrapped around coral pieces or objects in the tank.
These fish are adept at hiding in their environments with shades of brown and grey patterns that blend perfectly. Furthermore, their skin may even change depending on water temperature! Again, their snouts can expand and contract to probe cracks for food – usually mysid shrimp and small crustaceans such as crustaceans like shrimp. In addition, their long thin bills can then be used to suc up these treats using long skinny suckers attached to long thin beaks; additionally, they use their prehensile tails when relaxing or resting!
These fish are remarkable because they remain monogamous for their breeding season, sometimes lasting years. Both male and female seahorses possess a brood pouch on the front-facing side of their tail where eggs develop; male seahorses then fertilize these eggs using their sperm for up to three weeks after fertilizing them with their own.
White seahorses exhibit this characteristic. Scientists suspect this adaptation has come about due to tectonic shifts in the Pacific Ocean that created large areas of shallow water that allowed these fish to adapt and survive.
These seahorses move languidly, using only their dorsal fins for forward propulsion and pectoral fins for steering. Their maximum speed is only five feet (1.5 meters). To avoid being eaten by predators, they often creep through their habitats by twitching their heads or altering air volume levels in their swim bladders.
Sargassum Fish
The Sargassum Fish (Histrio histrio), part of the Frogfish Family, can usually live near floating clumps of Sargassum seaweed for camouflage in open waters. Although capable of swimming quickly, they often crawl through it using their pectoral fins like arms to move through. These identical pectoral fins may help transport prey from depth to the surface, where their jaws catch it before feeding upon seagrass or algae that make up its habitats. Sargassum fish have also been known to provide on both seagrasses and found in its environment clumps inhabited by this unique fish species!
The Sargassum fish isn’t technically endangered, but its existence is threatened by habitat loss and fishing practices. When its eggs hatch into larvae, they migrate to the surface through the seagrass clump, sticking their heads through it to begin eating.
According to recent evidence from Belize, this fish eats algae and may cause serious harm when exposed to coral reefs. Indeed, its blooms were believed to have contributed to a massive fish kill near San Pedro last year, including bonefish, permit, needlefish, and pufferfish being killed off due to sargassum blooms in that region.
As it grows, sargassum seaweed floats near shorelines, where it can smother coral reefs and alter seagrass beds. Suppose the seaweed gets too close to the land. In that case, however, it can begin decaying into hydrogen sulfide gas, emitting an unpleasant rotten egg-smelling odor that drives away beachgoers and negatively affects tourism. Furthermore, it blocks water intakes at power and desalination plants and has even been known to block power transmission lines with its thick layer.
Local communities face difficulty managing sargassum that washes ashore. Heavy machinery may clear it away, disrupting sea turtle nesting areas or leading to beach erosion. Furthermore, seaweed can block sunlight, devastatingly impacting benthic ecosystems; hypoxia occurs as oxygen deprivation. Ultimately, it would be better to naturally dissipate back out to sea than remain on shore and cause economic and ecological harm.
Sacramento Blackfish
Though not as glamorous or tasty as bass or crappie, Sacramento blackfish is integral to Clear Lake’s ecosystem. While few anglers encounter these native fish directly, they provide food sources for bass and are crucial to creating slough and oxbow habitats.
The Sacramento blackfish (Orthodon microlepidotus) is an agile cyprinid (minnow) well adapted to survive in the warm, turbid waters of the Lower Sacramento River Basin and Delta. To increase water flow across their gills and survive hypoxic environments, they increase ventilatory stroke volume during respiration by increasing ventilatory stroke volume during respiration; they feed on planktonic algae, floating detritus, zooplankton such as rotifers, copepods, cladocerans and diatoms among others; unlike all minnows they possess pharyngeal teeth in their throat behind last gill arch for easy feeding and protection against predators.
Sacramento blackfish differ from most North American cyprinids by using mouths and gills to filter food items individually. When they breathe in, large bursts of water pass through their oral cavity during respiration, pumping through to their respiratory organ, which pumps large shots through to their oral cavity while pumping large volumes through during the respiratory period; when this process finishes, food bits are caught within a layer of mucus produced on the roof of their mouth by an organ known as the palatal organ before swallowed altogether.
Blackfish fishes possess long, narrow bodies characterized by light to dark gray coloring on top and silvery on their sides. Their bodies feature a cone-shaped head with a flat-sloping forehead and small eyes and lips that are thin and upturned; their dorsal fin contains nine to eleven soft rays, while their caudal peduncle can reach long distances before disappearing underground.
This fish species can be found in California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin, Pajaro, and Salinas River drainages and Clear Lake in California and Nevada’s Russian and Humboldt rivers. While not threatening the ecosystem directly, its numbers have declined due to water pollution and other environmental stressors; for this reason, the UC Davis Wildlife Health Center recommends setting catch limits or not taking it altogether to preserve local populations.
