It Takes a Real Roughy to be a Slimehead

The orange roughy is a long-lived, deep sea fish that has quite a unique set of characteristics.  Despite its name, the roughy is actually a dark red in real life, only when it dies does its pigment fade to its widely given name.  

The orange roughy lives its life in cold waters taking its time maturing and mating.  While the average and oldest age can be disputed, there is no arguing this particular fish's staying power.  On average they can age to up...well...pretty damn old.  And that's as scientific as one can get.  But an old fishing tale has it the oldest roughy caught was 149.  He probably only looked 100.  Because they live in colder waters they tend to be on the sluggish side, which also complicates its mating ritual.  It takes a considerable amount of time before a roughy is ready to mate.   To put in perspective, the roughy is almost like a human.  It takes at least 20-30 for this animal to be reproductively mature.  So he's the post-college grad who just moved into his first apartment in the upper, upper east side looking for that wife to start passing on his genes.  

So how can an endearing fish such as the roughy carry a name like slimehead?  Simple, they were lovingly named after a physical trait which is common in their family, the muciferous (read: mucus) canals that run down their large heads.  Awwww...

To see a roughy one would probably recoil in horror.  Afterall, this is no Koi.  Rather the roughy takes pleasure in the fact that he is a bit of an anomaly.  Still ugly but still prized.  The roughy has found itself, unfortunately, in a position like that of his distant cousins.  He and his family are being hunted down to the point of collapse.  What makes this extra hard to take is that fishing has become so sophisticated that deep sea trawling can reach depths like never before.  This means relatively safe groups of roughy are now forced to either migrate or get caught.  That's like asking the handicapped to pick up their wheelchairs and run down the fire escape.  The roughy can't handle such brutal treatment.  

But this species is another fine example of the exotic life we are fortunate to have on our earth, and how we are squandering opportunities to preserve it.  Fish aren't masochists.  They don't like being hunted down.  They probably aren't great cuddlers (especially with mucus-y bodies and all) but they still deserve hugs.  Even the roughys.  But chances are you won't be able to dive that deep.  So just blow him a kiss.  He likes kisses.