Meet the Pacific hagfish.
It's a quite nasty creature which, in its disgustingness, is fascinating. It is covered in a thick slime. It is famous for being able to fill the water around it with more of this slime; basically, it's a snot bag. It has no jaws or stomach, but it does have five hearts. It eats dead or dying fish in a very repulsive manner- it slithers in, aided by that infamous slime, through the mouth (or more often, the anus) of the fish and eats it from the inside out, starting with the guts. This can cause problems for fishermen, who have found hagfish gobbling away at their valuable catches.509Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡx6bMQqQnit
The hagfish can occasionally produce too much slime. When this happens, it is in danger of choking on its own snot. It wrings itself out by tying itself in a knot and squeezing the mucus out of its body. A squirm, a squeeze, a flush of the gills, and all that extra snot just comes bubbling right out.
Its skin is loose, mostly unconnected to the muscle. This allows it to survive most shark attacks, as the teeth of the shark will penetrate only the skin, and that's if the shark is lucky. If the skin is penetrated, the hagfish will not bleed out because the skin has low blood pressure. It can also squirm through small cracks and crevices because of this loose hide. The inner body is tapered toward the tail, so when the hagfish goes through cracks, the blood that is squeezed backward pools in that well of sorts and the eel doesn't pop like an overfilled, slimy blood ballon. Its skin is often used to make eel skin wallets, so you might be carrying the remains of a hagfish in your pocket! Isn't that a delightful thought?
It has three common names: the one I'm using, the Pacific hagfish; the slime eel; and third, the image-provoking name of slime hag. Whichever name you prefer, they're all pretty accurate. I wouldn't want one for a pet, but they are pretty interesting.
Next month's species: still in consideration, but probably the hoatzin. Suggestions (the weirder, the better) are welcome.
Thank you for reading!
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