OPEN QUESTIONS

There is so much that we (as a species) have yet to learn about oarfish (as three species). Here are our current most important open questions:

Ecology

• How many oarfish are there?

Social behavior

• How does the oarfish find mates?
• Does the oarfish have other social interactions with fellow oarfish?

Survival behavior

• Can an oarfish swimming near the shore return to its regular habitat, or is this usually the start of a death sentence?
• How does the oarfish catch enough krill to sustain itself, given that it is not especially motile?

Autotomy

• Under what circumstances does the oarfish autotomize its tail?

• Does this occur at specific points?
• If there is more than one possible point of autotomy, can the oarfish do this multiple times?
• Are the evolutionary roots of oarfish autotomy the same as those for, say, lizards?

Size

• What is the true longest recorded oarfish?
• What is the evolutionary benefit to the oarfish of being long?

OUR WORK

[IN PROGRESS] Check out our ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY for convenient reference of oarfish studies, information, and sightings.