Dumb~ Puffer & Porcupine….Fish

Hahahaha~ I’ve just checked out Answers.com, and I found something really funny, until I can’t control the smile rested on my lips while working~ (even though I was just surfing the internet for nothing~)

The thing is:

Someone had asked a question and it’s sound like this:

What is the difference between puffer fish and porcupine?

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and that’s only one answer provided by a kind person, and its like this..

“fish=sea creature. porcupine= land creature. dumb question”

~^y^~

muahahahaha~

sudahlah tak faham orang punya soalan, malah pergi marah orang dumb?!!!

I don’t know why this question only invited one reply, maybe everyone that looks at the question and read it as the same meaning as the first respondent, or maybe they just laugh out loud on the first reply given? just like me now~~~~~ muaahahaha

okay.. I know porcupine is 箭猪 according to the dictionary. But how come you would thought that people will ask what’s the difference between a fish and a hedgehog? That’s quite ridiculous right? haha, alright, I should step in your shoes right? Ya, maybe the questioner just wanted to know the answer such as: fish is sea creature and porcupine is land creature.. What an ingenious question~

I was actually don’t know the answer too since the answer that I have in mind has been doubted by other people before this. So I decided to find the answer.

Puffer fish (normal) Puffer fish (inflated)

Porcupine fish (normal) Porcupine fish (inflated)

SCIENTIFIC CLASSIFICATION

COMMON NAME:
pufferfish, porcupinefish, puffers

KINGDOM:
Animalia

PHYLUM:
Chordata

CLASS:
Osteichthyes

ORDER:
Tetraodontiformes

FAMILY:
Tetraodontidae (puffers), Diodontidae (porcupinefish)

Okay, so here’s the explanation.

Puffer fish and porcupine fish can also known as blowfish, balloonfish, globefish or 河豚鱼，鸡泡鱼或泡泡鱼. Both are actually closely related since both of them can inflate themselves with water or air and balloon up to three times normal size.

However, they still poses some differences.

1. Porcupine have heavier spines on their body (that’s why they are called “porcupine”)

2. Porcupine have only a single plate of fused teeth in each of the upper and lower jaw (so total= 2, di=2, odon=tooth) but puffers have four teeth fused into their jaws (tetra=4, odon= tooth).

As commonly known their inflation is to deter their predator to eat them and reduces the range of potential predators to those with much bigger mouths. And when they balloon up, the sharp spines would be radiated outwards. These are what we usually have in mind.

But, FYI, this "puffing" ploy is used only in desperation, as the inflated puffer loses most of its maneuverability. A puffer would prefer to escape predators by swimming into a crevice.

And some species are poisonous by having tetradotoxin in their internal organs, e.g. ovaries and liver. Some scientists believe the poison is produced by several types of bacteria that are somehow obtained via the fish's diet, because fish bred in captivity are not poisonous, however, other scientists are skeptical of this theory. However, people in Asian countries still find them as a delicacy.

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References:

Burgess, W. and H.R. Axelrod. Pacific Marine Fishes. Book 1. Neptune City, NJ. T.F.H. Publications, Inc. Ltd. 1971.

Eschmeyer, W.N., Herald, E.S. and H. Hammann. Peterson Field Guide to Pacific Coast Fishes. New York. Houghton Mifflin Co. 1983.

Keiichi, Matsura & Tyler, James C. (1998). Paxton, J.R. & Eschmeyer, W.N.. ed. Encyclopedia of Fishes. San Diego: Academic Press. pp. 231. ISBN 0-12-547665-5.

Piper, Ross (2007), Extraordinary Animals: An Encyclopedia of Curious and Unusual Animals, Greenwood Press.

Balloonfish. Florida Museum of Natural History. Casey Patton. Accessed on June 24, 2005.

Froese, Rainer, and Daniel Pauly, eds. (2006). "Diodontidae" in FishBase. May 2006 version.

Froese, Rainer, and Daniel Pauly, eds. (2005). "Diodon holocanthus" in FishBase. May 2005 version.