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a-book-of-creatures · 1 day

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I think I stumbled upon some kind of ichthyological forbidden knowledge. Opened up a book of names that were never meant to be read.

You've probably heard of "can-opener smoothdream", right? It's practically a meme by now.

But the thing is, it's a deep-sea fish. And deep-sea fish have historically not had English names because nobody drops them into the conversation over a hot cuppa. Sure, there's generic stuff like hatchetfish and barreleye, but when you want to refer to the actual fish you're probably saying such euphonious phrases as Diretmus argenteus, Sternoptyx diaphana, or maybe even Opisthoproctus soleatus.

So whence "can-opener smoothdream"? Certainly no non-ichthyologist has ever used that name. It's not even a direct translation of the scientific name Chaenophryne longiceps - that would be "long-headed gape-toad". Which to me is even cooler than "can-opener smoothdream".

But I digress. The "dream" bit comes from the anglerfish family Oneirodidae, from oneiros, "dream", because those marvelous fishes look like they came out of a dream (Pietsch, 2009).

Note that Pietsch (2009), more or less the anglerfish bible, uses English names at the genus level only. So Chaenophryne is the smoothhead dreamers genus but no mention is made of "can-opener smoothdreams". So no luck there.

Wikipedia, root cause of a lot of misinformation, has this to say.

"Longhead dreamer" is a far more accurate name. And in fact, despite Wikipedia prioritizing "can-opener smoothdream" (because it's funny?), the links listed use "longhead dreamer" and "smoothhead dreamer" as the name and "can-opener smoothdream" as an alternative.

So. Again. Where did "can-opener smoothdream" come from?

The answer, as it turns out, lies with McAllister (1990).

In the book A List of the Fishes of Canada, ichthyologist D. E. McAllister sought out to list every single fish known to Canadian waters, providing both an English and a French name.

And when there wasn't an English name, like for most deep-sea fishes, he arbitrarily gave them a name. And his names "differ in many instances from the widely accepted names" (Holm, 1998)

This had varying results. This is his name for one of the netdevil anglerfishes.

The humpback anglerfish or blackdevil anglerfish becomes a werewolf (????).

This one is just confusing.

The white-spotted lanternfish or Rafinesque's lanternfish instead becomes...

And most embarrassingly, the Mediterranean spiderfish gets saddled with something that "violates the tenet of good taste" (Holm, 1998).

This then is the original source of "can-opener smoothdream". It was invented by an ichthyologist in 1990, and has seen little to no use outside of how bizarre the name is.

Maybe McAllister's goofier names will catch on. Who knows? They certainly aren't very popular in the scientific community though.

References

Holm, E. (1998) Encyclopedia of Canadian Fishes (review). The Canadian Field-Naturalist, 112, p. 174-175.

McAllister, D. E. (1990) A List of the Fishes of Canada. National Museum of Natural Sciences, Ottawa.

Pietsch, T. W. (2009) Oceanic Anglerfishes: Extraordinary Diversity in the Deep Sea. University of California Press, Berkeley.

#marine biology #fishes #can-opener smoothdream

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catchymemes · 3 months

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#aww #wholesome #funny #lol #haha #humor #meme #memes #fishes

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soupandcats · 3 months

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🌧️🐡🐟😚

#illustration #my art #soupandcats #digital art #procreate #digital illustration #drawing #fish art #fishes #fish #rain #aquarium #dreams

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marinememes · 11 months

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Super cool ocean fact: there is at least 6 fish in the ocean

#marine science #marine biology #this is so stupid but I wrote this at 1am #aquarium #text post #oceanposting #sea creatures #fish #fishblr #marine life #fishes #marine biology memes

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neorice · 23 days

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Neorice's Ocean

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bestial4ngel · 5 months

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S T U R G E O N S T A M P S ! !

#i hope that as a post on my blog this reads like the video of a neon sign quoting the bible and then randomly saying 6$ SHRIMP SPECIAL #me posting #bogposting #stamps #sturgeon #fishes #fish #marine life

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kirbyfigure · 1 year

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thisthat-ortheother · 1 month

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jaubaius · 2 years

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Aquarium under protection

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#fishes #aquarium #funny

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nepeteaa · 1 year

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Freshwater Fish of North America 🎣✨

this is Novembers monthly postcard along with a sockeye salmon sticker!

#fish #fishes #salmon #catfish #trout #rainbow trout #cabincore #nature #nature aesthetic #taxonomy #taxonomy poster #nature art #nature artist #artists on tumblr #mf pike calling me

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soupandcats · 1 month

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Fish, pointillist birds, grapple, Sondheim, and frank O’Hara

#illustration #my art #soupandcats #mixed media #oil pastel art #oil pastel #daily planner #daily drawing #hobonich art #hobonichi planner #hobonichi #stephen sondheim #there won’t be trumpets #frank ohara #fish art #fishes #journal #art journal

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marinememes · 4 months

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Today is Wet Beast Wednesday!

Today’s wet beast is: Pipefish

Olive’s wet beast fact: You’re probably thinking that these worm-on-a-string lookin ass creatures look like straightened seahorses. That’s bc they are part of the Syngnathidae family with Seahorses and Sea Dragons. Funky!

Stay tuned for more Wet Beast Wednesdays!