Skip to main content

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine and get a FREE tote.

Fish

Feast your eyes on the blind Somalian cavefish, which has—like mammals—mysteriously lost the ability to use light to fix damaged DNA.

Blind Cavefish Shed Light on the Dark Days of Mammalian Evolution

Like mammals, these cave-dwelling creatures have discarded a solar-powered system that repairs UV-damaged DNA

Katmai National Park and Preserve has a ton of chubby cubbies. But which bear's bulk will bury the competition in the 2018 Fat Bear Week?

Trending Today

Time to Get Jiggily With it, Fat Bear Week Is Upon Us

Your vote will determine which fish-chomping ursine competitor in Katmai National Park and Preserve is the chubbiest cubby of them all

Cool Finds

How Fish Farms Can Use Facial Recognition to Survey Sick Salmon

A Norwegian aquaculture company plans to combat sea lice and other problems by monitoring individual salmon in a high-tech fish farms

The dazzling pink and yellow fish is the only member of its genus known to reside in the Atlantic rather than the Pacific

Cool Finds

Newly Discovered Neon Fish Species Is Named After Greek Goddess of Love

Researchers were so entranced by the pink and yellow fish that they failed to spot a sixgill shark swimming just above their heads

R.I.P., guppy.

New Research

Praying Mantis Seen Hunting Fish for the First Time

The ravenous insect repeatedly returned to the hunting site, suggesting praying mantises may be capable of complex learning

New research shows that fish can tell the differences between quantities. What does that mean for our special human brains?

One Fish, Two Fish, Fish Can Count(ish?)

New research shows—again—that fish “count” like humans do. Are our cognitive evolutionary roots fishier than we thought?

Trending Today

This Fish Outlived Dinosaurs But Oil and Gas Drilling May Threaten Its Survival

Oil exploration is set to begin near the habitat of the critically endangered coelacanth, a type of fish that has survived over 400 million years

Do you smell something, Bob?

New Research

Ocean Acidification Is Frying Fish’s Sense of Smell

By the end of the century, the ocean is predicted to become two-and-a-half times more acidic, which is bad news for sea life.

These ephemeral puddles are the birthplace, home and grave of the killifish.

New Research

Meet the Fish That Grows Up in Just 14 Days

The turquoise killifish, which lives in ephemeral pools in Mozambique, progresses from embryo to sexual maturity faster than any other vertebrate

A fisher from a small-scale fishery in Honduras hooks a yellowtail snapper—a species of fish that may vary its shape depending on where it's sourced.

To Pinpoint the Origin of a Fish, Check Out Its Physique

A new cost-effective tool may help small-scale fisheries simply and accurately determine the origins of a day’s catch.

Trending Today

Chicago Says Goodbye to Its Last Tiny Waterfall

Niagara, it was not

Male bat-eared foxes spend much of their time with their offspring, grooming, engaging them in play and teaching them to forage.

This Is Your Brain on Fatherhood

What clownfish stepfathers and Dad-of-the-Year foxes teach us about paternal neurochemistry in the animal kingdom

New Research

Coral Reefs Need Fewer Rats and More Bird Poo

A study of rat-infested islands in the Chagos show that a lack of seabirds—and their guano—degrades surrounding coral ecosystems

Archaeologists discovered evidence of an array of foods, including herring, eel, cod, apples, raspberries, cherries and rye bread

Cool Finds

Archaeologists Unseal 17th-Century Danish Latrines to Discover Copenhageners’ Dietary Habits

The Danish finds reveal their owners’ rich diet of fish and meat, fruits, spices—and the presence of parasites, including tapeworms and roundworms

The Boquera brothers (above, Fèlix) are the fourth generation in their family to work the sea off the Costa Brava of Catalonia.

Catalonia

How a Fallback to Historic Traditions Might Save Catalonia’s Red Shrimp Fishery

The Boquera brothers, two fishermen from the Costa Brava, are part an innovative management plan that combines science with maritime skills and knowledge

Trending Today

How the Belize Barrier Reef Beat the Endangered List

An oil drilling moratorium, development restrictions and fishing reform has helped the 200-mile-reef come off Unesco’s endangered world heritage sites list

From glow-in-the-dark squid to the terrifying stoplight loosejaw, creatures of the deep have evolved their own living light time and time again.

Why Bioluminescence Evolved to Be Red Light, and Blue

The laws of nature constrict living light to a few hues, which also happen to be quite patriotic

An Intense Struggle to Catch a Giant West African Tarpon

Famed fisherman and adventurer Andy Coetzee thinks he may have snared a giant barracuda. He hasn’t, but he’s caught another interesting and prized fish

Why These Lagoons Are Full of Giant Barracuda

The maze of lagoons in Loango National Park, in Gabon, isn’t just a good place to hunt barracudas—it’s also an ancient migratory route

Braving Shark-Infested Waters for a Look at This Big Fish

Fisherman Andy Coetzee is in the middle of a dangerous dive, in the shark-filled waters of the Indian Ocean

Page 21 of 35