📸 PhotoPhoto: Richard ling · CC BY 2.0 · Wikimedia Commons Source
Live sharksucker
Echeneis naucrates (Live sharksucker · コバンザメ)
💡 Everyday Comparisons for Size, Mass & Speed
- 💡 Its maximum weight of 2.3 kg is the weight of one and a half 1.5 L plastic bottles (Comparison).
- 💡 In the past, fishermen tied a line to this fish, released it into the sea, and hauled the line in once it attached to a large fish, using it as a fishing aid (Animal Diversity Web).
- 💡 In Korea, it has been recorded in Samcheok, Busan, Yeosu, Mokpo, and Jeju Island (National List of Species of Korea).
Reference standards: coach bus ~12 m, mid-size car ~4.9 m, compact car ~1 t, basketball hoop 3.05 m, credit card 8.56 cm.
Site-computed relative index from recorded values; not a formal scientific metric.
📖 1. Overview
The Live sharksucker is a fish that uses the sucking disc on top of its head to attach itself to sharks, whales, turtles, and ships. It is the most common remora in warm seas.
🦴 2. Anatomy & Morphology
Its body is long and rod-shaped, and its modified dorsal fin forms a sucking disc on top of the head with multiple pairs of transverse ridges, creating a strong vacuum to cling to a host. A white longitudinal stripe runs along the side of its body.
🔍 3. Ecology & Behavior
It feeds on food scraps dropped by its host, parasites on the host's body, and small fishes and crustaceans. It has a commensal relationship in which it gains food and transportation without harming the host, and spawns during the warm months of spring and early summer.
🇰🇷 4. Connection to Korea
According to the National List of Species of Korea, it has been recorded in Samcheok, Busan, Yeosu, Mokpo, and Jeju Island.
📚 Sources & References
- • IUCN Red List LC (2015) — https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/190393/115317934
- • IUCN Red List category LC — latest assessment at iucnredlist.org
- • catalogueoflife.org — 6DTSX
- • iucnredlist.org — 115317934
- • 국가생물종목록(국립생물자원관) ktsn 120000058447 — https://species.nibr.go.kr/home/mainHome.do?cont_link=009&subMenu=009002&contCd=009002&ktsn=120000058447
- • wikidata.org — Q1156517
- • commons.wikimedia.org — File:Echeneis naucrates.jpg
- • fishbase.se — Echeneis-naucrates.html
- • species.nibr.go.kr — mainHome.do
- • animaldiversity.org — Echeneis naucrates
- • Silhouette: PhyloPic — author not recorded · Public Domain Mark 1.0
Recorded dimensions are widely cited representative estimates from public literature and may vary by study or specimen.