Scientists just discovered the Snuffleupagus of the sea

Over the past century, scientists have discovered all manner of weird and charismatic creatures on Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. They’ve found shrimp that can see colors humans can't imagine and fish that can change their sex at will. But until recently, one species had eluded them: a strange and cryptic fish that bears a striking resemblance to a beloved Sesame Street character.

In a study published this month in Fish Biology, scientists announced the discovery of Solenostomus snuffleupagus, a new species of ghost pipefish named for its uncanny resemblance to Mr. Snuffleupagus, the woolly-mammoth-inspired character from Sesame Street. While the fish’s name is certainly catchy, it’s hardly the coolest thing about this species. 

An epic search

Over twenty years ago, David Harasti, a marine scientist at Australia’s Port Stephens Fisheries Institute, was scuba diving off the coast of Papua New Guinea when he saw a fish unlike any he’d ever seen. Its snout was nearly as long as its body, and it was covered in long, flowing brown-orange filaments that made it nearly indistinguishable from a clump of algae. 

After the dive, Harasti couldn't get the fish off his mind. A few years later, he told a colleague that if the fuzzy fish turned out to be a new species, he wanted to name it after Mr. Snuffleupagus.

Not long after, Harasti and that colleague, an ichthyologist named Graham Short, who works for the California Academy of Sciences and the Australian Museum, set out in search of that fish. Harasti went back to Papua New Guinea five times while Short searched through a mountain of museum specimens. But it wasn’t until 2021 that the pair made a breakthrough.

Scuba divers on the Great Barrier Reef claimed to have seen several stubby, fuzzy fish swimming around. The researchers rushed to the reef and immediately started searching. On their first dive, they didn’t find anything, but on their second, a pair of ghost pipefish revealed themselves. 

“We were just high-fiving, hugging underwater. I was actually screaming, I was so happy,” recalls Short. 

Strange new fish

After celebrating their find, the researchers collected the specimens and brought them back to the lab for further study. DNA analysis confirmed that the fish were, in fact, a new species of ghost pipefish, a family of fish that tends to resemble branches of coral or seaweed and typically use their tiny, straw-like mouths to suck up small crustaceans.  They’re closely related to true pipefish and seahorses, but they belong to a separate evolutionary lineage.

And among the ghost pipefish, Solenostomus snuffleupagus is unique. They appear to be half the size of the average ghost pipefish, measuring just 4–5 centimeters, or the length of a golf tee. What’s more, they may also eat other fish. While performing CT scans of the specimens, the researchers found a small fish inside the stomach of one of the Solenostomus snuffleupagus. 

Most notably, they’re covered in hair-like filaments. After scanning the citizen science platform iNaturalist, the researchers realized their Snuffleupagus of the Sea had been spotted across the South Pacific in recent years, showing up in Tonga, Papua New Guinea, and New Caledonia. And across their range, the fish varied in color from bright reds and purples to earthy oranges and browns.

“They resemble floating tufts of algae,” says Short. “Even their movements resemble algae in the water. They hover near it, and if you're not keenly aware, you’ll swim right by it.” 

Short continues to work on discovering new species, and researchers say that the discovery of the Snuffleupagus fish bodes well for the future. 

“It’s like finding Bigfoot except that he’s teeny tiny,” says Kory Evans, an ichthyologist and assistant professor at Rice University, who was not involved with the study. “I wouldn’t be surprised if there were many more undescribed ghost pipefishes.”