Pufferfish

Depth: 30 m · Sunlight Zone

When threatened, the pufferfish can quickly pump itself full of water and become a spiky ball that no predator wants to swallow. Many pufferfish also carry a strong poison inside them. They swim rather slowly with small fins.

For scientists

The pufferfish gulps water into a stretchy stomach and triples its volume to inflate; some also have spines. Its poison, tetrodotoxin, is one of the strongest in nature and probably comes from bacteria in its food. Instead of many teeth it has a beak-like plate to crack shells and crabs.

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