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Underwater video reveals novel behavioural interactions: a case study of a repeated ongoing association between a sharksucker Echeneis naucrates and a yellowtail parrotfish Sparisoma rubripinne

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 August 2025

David Shiffman Open the ORCID record for David Shiffman [Opens in a new window] ,
Erin J Burge ,
Brooke Flammang ,
Colin Foord ,
Melissa Marquez ,
Kat Mowle ,
Joshua Drew  and
C. S. Sherman
David Shiffman*
Affiliation:
David Shiffman Scientific and Environmental Consulting, Washington, DC, USA
Erin J Burge
Affiliation:
Department of Marine Science, Coastal Carolina University, Conway, SC, USA
Brooke Flammang
Affiliation:
Department of Biological Sciences, New Jersey Institute of Technology, Newark, NJ, USA
Colin Foord
Affiliation:
Coral Morphologic, Miami, Florida, USA
Melissa Marquez
Affiliation:
Melissa Cristina Márquez (School of) Molecular and Life Sciences, Curtin University, Perth, WA, Australia
Kat Mowle
Affiliation:
South-East Zoo Alliance for Reproduction and Conservation, Yulee, FL, USA
Joshua Drew
Affiliation:
Department of Environmental Biology, State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry, 1 Forestry Drive, Syracuse, NY, USA
C. S. Sherman
Affiliation:
School of Life and Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Science, Engineering and Built Environment, Deakin University, Geelong, VIC, Australia
*
Corresponding author: David Shiffman; Email: david.shiffman@gmail.com
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Abstract

The ecological sciences have historically relied on field stations for long-term observations of specific populations, ecosystems, and even individual animals. Travel reductions due to the COVID-19 pandemic and increasing concerns about the carbon footprint of scientific research, have led to calls for other ways of doing research. Emerging technological trends and the growth of community science have resulted in the increased deployment of livestream cameras set up in ecologically interesting areas all over the world.Methods: One such setup is Coral City Camera, a livestream from a coral reef near Miami, Florida, which attracted a widespread following during the COVID-19 pandemic and spawned a large and diverse community of observers. The associated Facebook group, where videos are shared and discussed has, as of July 16 2023, more than 500 members, and the livestream has been viewed by more than 2.3 million people from all over the world. Using the Coral City Camera livestream and the associated community of observers, we document here a novel ecological interaction: a sharksucker, Echeneis naucrates, repeatedly attached to an individual yellowtail parrotfish, Sparisoma rubripinne, which may have occurred on 94 days within a 283-day time period. If it was indeed the same sharksucker on the same parrotfish, this would be the longest interaction documented between a sharksucker and any host. This observation was only possible due to the nature of this livestreamed underwater video and its associated community of enthusiastic observers, whose observations brought this interaction to the attention of the scientific community. A similar setup could be more widely utilised.

Keywords

citizen sciencecommunity sciencecoral reefsintraspecific interactionsmarine biologyremoraunderwater camera

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom , Volume 105 , 2025 , e89
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2025. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom.

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Footnotes

Open Research: No data were collected for this study, other than publicly available video (i.e., theoretical, review, opinion, editorial papers).

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