#Hagfish. Hag.

[praetorqueenreyna]

Favorite and least favorite aquatic animal for the ask game

(marine biology ask game!)

OMG I LOVE SO MANY AQUATIC ANIMALS!!! but one that has been a classic fave since childhood is the hagfish!

It's a primitive jawless fish with no bones and doesn't even have a true vertebrae. They have no stomach and 5 hearts. If you cut them they do not bleed. They can fully tie themselves into knots. They produce insane quantities of slime that is made of incredibly strong fiber. Their skin is used to make eelskin clothing. THEY'RE JUST REALLY COOL!!!!

OKAY SO it's hard to pick a LEAST favorite aquatic animal, BUT I have worked in ocean tourism for a decade and I get very annoyed by the charismatic sea creatures that everyone loves that are actually really gross and annoying. Top of that list is the ocean sunfish (full of parasites, super dumb, will spit at you) and sea otters (will commit many crimes, have a PR firm that tells lies for them to make money).

[silentstaresfanficandfanart]

if i were n hagfish id be hagging it up so much rn you guys hva eno i dea there would be slime everywhere and i would be scquirming in geometric shapes you people wouldn't even be able to comprehend you'd be seeing me slipping in and out of the fourth dimension and inventing my own within the tangles of slime string and my own writhing form, i would write epics in my slithering shapes and there would be no word uttered by a human tongue that could not be found in my endless length

there would be no story untold, no color unseen in the layers of slime and goop that refract and shimmer between the layers of reality

hagfish

[chocolatechipkraken]

Happy National Hagfish Day, everybody! :)

Gemuary 2023 Day 31: Obsidian

Obsidian is a volcanic glass formed when lava rapidly cools. Sometimes it can have inclusions that can give it cool features like banding or a golden sheen. It's been used to make blades since ancient times.

I figured I'd show you all my volcanic hagfish kaiju gal Magma Hag for today! I thought her design could use some extra oomph, and I think a bit of banding and a bladed tail looks pretty nice on her! She swims through earth and secretes lava from her skin, and her hair is a kind of volcanic glass called 'Pele's Hair'.

And with that Gemuary 2023 is done! Phew! Which one was your favorite? Would anyone like me to do this again next year?

[acecasinova]

-slides in with an hour and a half to spare-

MER-MAY!!!

Deep sea bioluminesence HAD to be the route for Edelweiss, since he's just a lil whispers bard with a hag grandma~ (Also ofc he's got some hagfish buddies) His eyes glow in the dark normally and it toooootally wasn't an excuse to play with glowing layers noooooooo~

[mtsodie]

favorite deep sea creature? mine is the hagfish

ouh ... hag fish ... idk very much about the ocean but i do quite enjoy sea angels : )

[realrogerhours]

HAG FISH ANON THATS ME IM HAGFISH ANON YEAH HAGFISH ANON

Instead of giving me fish food pellets you just chick hagfish into the enclosure!!!!!

hey she has a gift for you

[thedurvin]

Needs a Hagfish Hag

2″ Scale Figure Concepts

Working Title: Fury Zone-A

[fear-the-hippo]

Spooky Species: Hagfish

Some of you may have seen this photo before.

And yes, while these guys first were considered due to their infamous shark-suffocating slime, I wasn’t initially sold on including them. 

I’m sold on it now.

The hagfish, also (rather appropriately) called the slime eel, is a species of marine fish that can loosely be called a vertebrate, in that it has a moderately bony skull but entirely lacks a proper vertebral column/spine, instead trying to get away with just some rudimentary cartilaginous vertebrae. Hagfish have been around for something like 300 million years, solidly predating the existence of mammals and birds and roughly coinciding with the invention of the dinosaurs. They have solidly refused to change over this entire period, with modern hagfish being nearly identical to the fossilized ones.

“But this isn’t particularly spooky,” you say. “It’s just a really old slimy fish,” you say. “It doesn’t even have teeth.”

You’re wrong. This thing is lovably horrid, and its mouth isn’t even the weirdest part of its anatomy. Those “teeth” are made of keratin, the same substance as our hair and fingernails, and are attached to cartilaginous plates that extend and retract in a scraping motion, shredding into its food and drawing it back into its throat. What does it eat? Well, one of two things. Option A is to hunt down various invertebrates and fish. Option B is to find a rotting, recently dead, or dying but very much still alive animal like a seal, whale, or shark, burrow into it, and devour it from the inside out, mostly with your mouth but also by absorbing any dissolved organic matter through your skin and gills, because you’re a bottom-dwelling scavenger with a slow metabolism and need to maximize whatever nutrition you can get on the sporadic occasions you find food.

Yes. Its skin. Its skin which, by the way, has no scales and covers the body “like a loosely-fitting sock”, only physically attached to it along its not-really-a-spine and at its slime glands. Essentially it’s like if someone stitched your shirt into your back in a straight line and left it unattached everywhere else. Like whoever made this thing just gave up putting its skin on it. And did I mention that this skin sack contains approximately a third of its blood volume? Because it does. This thing is essentially a lazily made sack of blood. So lazily made it doesn’t even have proper fins. Or proper eyes. Some of them have an eyespot or two that can detect light, but don’t have lenses and can’t properly resolve images. Some of them don’t even have THAT.

While researching them I found the phrase “of interest to evolutionary biologists” like four times in the same article. I feel like that says something about how insanely primitive this fish is. It doesn’t really have much to do with anything else, I just thought it was funny.

And, of course, I can’t talk about the hagfish without bringing up the infamous slime.

This slime is produced through about 100 glands along the fish’s sides, which they release when stressed or threatened as a defense mechanism. This slime contains many thin, keratin-like protein fibers that make it thicker and more durable than the slime produced by other animals (so durable we’ve even found it in hagfish fossils), while also serving to make it extremely flexible. The slime actually traps water in its filaments, which makes it slower to dissipate and more viscoelastic than a simple gel. This viscosity actually gets worse when flowing in an elongated manner, making it much more likely to clog the gills of an attacking fish, but decreases under sufficient friction, allowing the hagfish to escape its own slime via a sort of knotted slithering motion and escape its predators, which are generally far less flexible and therefore not very adept at tying themselves in knots. Weird as this stuff is, hagfish slime is actually under investigation as a potential way of making fiber for textiles, as the keratin threads in the slime can be spun into a highly durable thread that could be used to make things like body armor. 

Cool, weird, gross- whatever your thoughts, you gotta admit hagfish earned their place in the Spooky Species lineup.

[knoggart]

Day 12: Hag (Lolly)

[c-u-c-koo-4-40k]

Love the tall of fantasy potions. And hag fish slime proteins Can actually be used to make clothes apparently (or the research on that is in the beginning stages.)

But I Could see a hagfish poultice working underwater in a fantasy setting. Especially when mixed with other ingredients.

In a certain method...maybe the hagfish slime works like...not a water Proof bandage, but a bandage that doesn't lose its adhesion underwater.

Interesting stuff to chew on.

And Alcyon giving Cedric an indirect compliment. Very sweet.

Also I have no doubt Malaran would Try to start shit. Because he is kinda a lil shit in a big shit body. Love him though.

Cedric: From One Healer to Another

Of Fin and Feathers AU: Cedric gets to meet his aunt, Amelia, a harpy healer... and Alcyon, her bonded chaos Iron Warrior mer.

Author's Note:

Erriox (to Alcyon): Amelia will be safe. Cedric may be a Black Templar, but he won't hurt her. Besides, Lenora is there.

Alcyon: Black Templar >:(

********

Cedric: How could someone be so nice and be bonded to that chaos heretic! >:(

Here's a light and fun fic to make up for the last two emotionally heavy ones. :) Thanks to @sleepyfan-blog for letting me borrow Cedric. He is adorable. Also mention of Arnault from @kit-williams. Yes, Alcyon has an intense bond with Amelia, like Arnault and Angela.

OCs: HarpyLenora, MerErriox (Iron Warrior OC), HarpyAmelia, MerAlcyon (Chaos Iron Warrior OC), MerCedric (Black Templar OC (c) @sleepyfan-blog)

Tagged: @shadowfirecat , @kit-williams , @bleedingichorhearts , @barn-anon , @gallifreyianrosearkytiorsusan

@sleepyfan-blog, @c-u-c-koo-4-40k, @bispecsual , @ms--lobotomy , @whorety-k

Lenora watched Cedric continuously grind the paste with his mortar and pestle with interest.

“What are you making?” she asked. 

“Ah… I’m making poultices for surface wounds.” The black and white mer replied, not stopping in grinding the paste, “It’s to protect the open wounds to prevent infection and possible contaminants from entering. Could you pass some of your down feathers?”

The osprey harpy handed her son the container of down feathers. Cedric took a few and grinded them into the paste. 

“And do you slather it onto the bandages before storing them? I couldn’t imagine it being easy to put on the poultice underwater.” Lenora remarked. 

“Some of the bandages will be coated with the poultice before storing. The rest will be stored in containers for manual application.” Cedric replied. He dipped his finger into the poultice he was making and took a glob out for the harpy to inspect, “The paste holds better than it looks. The addition of hagfish slime to the poultice allows it to hold well underwater and on land.” He explained, happy that his mother was taking an interest in his work. 

“Interesting.” Lenora smushed the glob around her clawed digits. What an interesting texture. She also noticed a cooling effect to it. Harpies sometimes used poultices, but it meant that they would have to be landlocked for a while to allow the poultice to work since the paste would start to dissolve underwater. It was rather inconvenient for harpies that lived around water, so potions tend to be used. With this though… this might work. It would be helpful in using poultices instead so that potions can be used for more extensive injuries. 

“Is it mint that is causing the cooling effect?” She asked. 

“Part of it.” Her son replied, “The mint is mixed in with aloe.”

Lenora nodded. A thought occurred to her, “Cedric, would you like to meet Amelia? She’s a healer too and would probably be interested in learning from you.”

“Yes, I would like to meet her! Do you think she will bring Ben along too?” He replied excitedly. 

“Maybe.”

Cedric brightened, it would be really nice to learn from his ‘aunt’ too and trade information with a fellow healer, especially one of a different species from him. You never know what you learn that may come in handy after all. Maybe she might bring Ben as well. His mother mentioned them sometimes, but he and his brothers had yet to meet them still. Cedric hoped to finally meet his little cousin too.

“If they do visit, it is likely that both their bonded will come with them.” Lenora warned, “I only ask that you not get into a fight with them, should they come too.”

The Primaris scoutling’s face scrunched in distaste, “I can… do that…” he replied. He nearly forgot about them. Right… if Amelia’s his aunt in name, then that chaos heretic would be his “uncle”. Cedric cringed, visibly disturbed. Nope. Nope. No, they’re of no relation. He is not about to call chaos anything that. Ugh… he doesn’t like it, but he has dealt with worse than ornery battle brothers as his patients in his experience as an apothecary, so dealing with the two chaos mers couldn’t be that much worse. Cedric can be professionally detached when he needs to be. He can behave as his mother requested. 

Lenora watched her son’s expression with amusement. She knew how much her boys disliked chaos-aligned mers. But she trusted that they would behave if she asked that of them. She could trust that they would at least leave the other alone and not goad them into a fight. 

“You sure you can do that?” She chuckled. 

Cedric straightened his posture, “Yes.” He replied confidently. 

Lenora smiled, “Alright. I’ll go talk to her.” and left to find Amelia. 

She managed to secure a visit from the harpy healer the next morning, since she had time and Alcyon coincidentally would be patrolling with Erriox that day. 

The next day came and Erriox said his goodbyes before taking off. Alcyon and Amelia arrived at their family nest shortly after he left. Cedric's eyes widened and his fins flared at the sight of the large scarred mer who protectively curled around his plover harpy mate upon entering the cave and spotting the Black Templar scoutling. His mind screamed danger. The chaos mer was larger than Erriox, almost about Claude’s length (in his shark-tailed form). The young Primaris mer could tell the chaos mer had centuries more battle experience over him, judging from all his healed over scars, discoloured healed fins, and prosthetics replacing his right eye and left forearm. He would be hard to beat in a fair fight. Not that chaos mers would fight fair, in his opinion. 

Cedric placed himself, not so subtly, in front of Lenora to protect her. His eyes were sharp and muscles tensed, ready for any attack from the chaos mer-Astartes. Lenora smiled exasperatedly as she stepped to the side of him. 

“Whelp. You hurt my mate and I will end you. I don’t care if you are my brother’s son or not.” Alcyon growled at the apothecary-in-training, still protectively curled around his bond-mate.

“I will not…”Cedric bristled with indignation, feeling insulted by the chaos mer’s implication. He might be a loyalist and didn’t trust chaos mers as far as he could throw them, but it didn’t mean he would harm his bonded! Let alone someone who’s a close friend to his mother!

A brush from Lenora’s wing calmed him down. She smiled at him, “Easy, Cedric…” she murmured. 

The young apothecary felt vindicated in a petty way watching the large mer get scolded by his smaller harpy mate for his rude behaviour, “Alcyon! I told you to be nice to the youngling! He will not hurt me. Have some faith in Lenora at least.”

“I know.” The fierce mer grumbled, “but he is a Black Templar…”

“Lenora has two Black Templar sons, and no harpy has ever been harmed by them.” The plover harpy refuted.

Alcyon let out of huff, “Fine.” He called out to the osprey harpy, “Lenora, her safety’s in your hands.”

Cedric’s dorsal fin flared and he let out a low growl at the perceived threat towards his mother. The chaos mer ignored him, focusing on his mate instead. Rude.

Lenora snorted, “Amelia is safe with me. There won’t be a feather out of place.” She reassured with good humor, patting Cedric’s back to ease him. 

“Everything will be fine, I promise. Go. Erriox is waiting.” Amelia cooed, reaching up to caress her mate’s cheek. Alcyon held her close and nuzzled her, “I should be back by nightfall. If not, Malaran knows that you are here.” 

“Of course.” They shared a kiss before the chaos merAstartes swam off to join his legion brother.

Cedric stared at them, still unbelieving that a chaos mer would be so tender and protective towards their bonded. Maybe they shared a bond like his big brother Arnault and his bonded, Angela. It would explain how intensely guarded Alcyon was over Amelia. And Amelia’s son, Ben, was apparently bonded to a Black Legion chaos mer. Does this bonding phenomena run in the family? His mother didn’t have any biological children, so he can’t really say. Cedric hypothesized that if she did, her child might end up bonding with a loyalist mer if that was the case. 

“I’m sorry Cedric, Alcyon can be very overprotective of me. And well, he doesn’t like Black Templars very much.” Amelia apologized, somewhat embarrassed by her mate’s posturing. She reached out her clawed hand, “It’s nice to finally meet you. I’m happy to meet an Astartes apothecary.”

Cedric shook her hand, giving his aunt a smile to put her at ease, “It’s… alright. Bonded mers tend to be intensely overprotective over their non-Astartes partners. It’s nice to meet you too. Mutter told me all about you and Ben.”

“Speaking of… where is Ben anyway?” Lenora asked. 

Amelia gave a helpless smile, “He’s flight training with Malaran. He’s very enthusiastic about being able to knock Erriox over.”

The osprey harpy laughed, “We’ll see about that!” Knowing how solidly built her mate was.

Cedric chuckled at the thought of a small plover harpy cannonballing into his older Iron Warrior cousin.

“Cedric, Lenora mentioned to me about how you make your poultice. It sounds interesting. You added hagfish slime to it?” Amelia asked. 

The Black Templar scoutling confirmed with an excited trill, “Yes! The hagfish slime keeps the poultice intact while underwater.” 

The harpy healer hummed, impressed, “That’s what’s missing from our poultices. While poultices work for surface wounds on land, it causes harpies to be landlocked for a while because they would start losing effect and start to dissolve in water. Which is rather inconvenient for us living by the water.” 

“Hagfish slime isn’t easy for us to obtain either, as they reside too deep for us to reach.” His mother added. 

Cedric thought for a moment and then asked Lenora, “One hagfish produces a large amount of that slime coating. What do you think of keeping a hagfish around?”

Both harpies hesitated, having seen the mess that a few spilled hagfish can cause when they visited the siren sisters of the Storm Rocks to do some trading. 

“I would say, maybe keep a few hagfish to an area underwater by feeding them, and harvest their slime that way. I’m not keen on cleaning up a mess of slime from our nest if an accident happens, and neither would Erriox.” The osprey harpy gently nixed his idea. 

The black and white mer pouted a little, but he understood what his mother meant. Plus, Cedric could see an accident like that happening from he and his brothers’ roughhousing. He sighed, the other suggestion his mother gave wasn’t a bad one though, he could work with that. 

Amelia nudged Cedric gently, giggling, “We’ve seen the aftermath of a hagfish spill, it’s a big mess from only three hagfish. I am curious about your poultice recipe though, would you mind telling me so I can write the recipe down and try it?”

Cedric nodded, “Of course! If you don’t mind telling me yours as well. We could trade results! It would be nice to have a comparison to see what can be improved.”

“I agree.” Amelia smiled at her nephew. Lenora handed them both a loaded ink quill and parchment as they dictated and discussed their poultice recipes with one another.

Time passed by all too quickly. They were deep in discussion about the different cone snail toxins that could be effective pain relievers in healing potions when Alcyon and Erriox returned from their patrol. 

Amelia churred and nuzzled her mate, pleased with his safe return, when the larger chaos mer wrapped her in his embrace, “Hello Alcyon. Your patrol went well?” 

Alcyon purred and kissed her temple, “All is calm and rather boring. I see that you are unharmed.”

“Everything is fine, like I told you. Quit looking down on the poor fledgling!” Amelia chided him. 

Cedric glared and hissed at the chaos Iron Warrior, “I would never harm anyone’s bonded, let alone a friend of meine Mutter! Don’t insult me!”

Alcyon stared at him evenly, commenting to Erriox and Lenora, “Good to see this one has a backbone on him.” Then turned to his mate who finished gathering her things into her bag, “Ready to go?” He asked. 

Amelia smiled and bid them goodbye before heading to the cave entrance. She flew off with Alcyon diving into the water, following close behind. 

Cedric blinked in confusion, his jaw falling slightly open, “Was that…?” 

Erriox laughed and clapped a hand on his adopted son’s shoulder, “Consider that his compliment and his approval.” 

The young apothecary didn’t know how to feel about that, but he supposed at least he won’t have to worry about the chaos Iron Warrior glaring at him anytime he interacts with the harpy healer in the future. 

Lenora smiled, “That worked out quite well.”

Cedric frowned slightly, “I guess… but I don’t like his attitude towards you, Mutter.”

“Alcyon can be rather abrasive, so I do appreciate your patience with him. Thank you for that.” She nuzzled him. 

Feeling happy at the compliment, Cedric let out a soft purr and nuzzled her back, “You’re welcome, Mutter.”

[lillamolntuss]

found my soulmate

[i-am-worm]

BONUS Inktober 2019 - Day 21 - Treasure

Bonus picture featuring my Hagfish mermaid finding some sunken treasure. ;3

[bi-any-chance]

HAGS from vampire anon, we didn't really talk but you seemed pretty chill. *School out plays*

Thanks! Lmao you have a great summer too!

But b4 I Googled HAGS, and found out it means Have A Great Summer, this happened:

Here's our boi Hagfish coming out for Pride Month:

I am so proud, he is so brave. 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈

[fishdontexist]

The Hagfish are not fish, avoid meeting them in threes. I will be hearing no one out

[normal-horoscopes]

It's so fucked up that hagfish can't understand how slimy they are. They're literally the slimiest creatures on earth, slimier than the next contender by thousands of times. They are quite possibly the slimiest living thing in all of creation and they have no idea. They live their tiny hagfish lives blissfully ignorant of their sheer impossible proclivity for slime production.

Do hagfish even comprehend slime? Do they have neurons that can recognize the shadow of their towering biological achievement? Or is it just background noise to the subjective experience of hag-fishness? I hope they can at least recognize their slime like how humans can recognize their spit; as something we produce and are responsible for.

I know hagfish don't really sleep, but I hope every hagfish wakes up every day, looks themselves in a little hagfish mirror and goes "Another day of being the slimiest motherfucker in existence. Fuck yes."

[t4tails]

i hate the hagfish day post because i cant see the word hag without think of the term fag hag so everytime i see it i just think fag hagfish