Pufferfish eaten alive

I'm really proud of filming this extremely rare event of snapper eating a starry toado at the Poor Knights Islands, NZ.

Enjoy the show:

Gee poor little fella, he put up a good fight..:-(

Fascinating!!

Poor guy, felt bad for him.

Steve

Cool catch! The snappers figured out to attack the slim end and shake out the air!

Why was the puffer swimming along the surface already puffed up? That doesn't seem natural behaviour.

Why was the puffer swimming along the surface already puffed up? That doesn't seem natural behaviour.

I'm glad you asked, because I was wondering the same thing. Thanks.

I've seen that behavior a few times. In fact, I actually saw about 5 of them all at the surface over 100m depth. Nothing around with the exception of dolphins. Saw this over a few days. Perhaps it's water temp?

Why was the puffer swimming along the surface already puffed up? That doesn't seem natural behaviour.

I have puffed a bunch of puffers over the years but that's not the story in this case. It's easy to tell from the video: First thing a puffed blowfish does is to rotate away from you and then to make a run. I was surprised to see this one come my way (probably to seek protection). In fact, I kept swimming away from it because it was too close to my camera... It's very rare to see starry toado here in NZ but our fish seem to know that they are easy prey and go for them hard. I know of at least two more accounts of exactly the same thing. Here's the only other video that I'm aware of:

https://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=348870161162

http://diving.co.nz/about/dive_blog/entry/...ble_at_trevors/