Smart Fish

By sunup, the orange dotted tuskfish has already arrived at his workshop on Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, and to get ahead in this challenging world it has opted for ingenuity. It has joined the exclusive club of animals – predominantly mammals and birds – that have found ways of using ‘tools’. It likes to eat clams, so it uses a neat trick to expose one buried in the sand. Instead of blowing a mouthful of water at it, the fish turns away from the clam and snaps shut its gill covers, blasting water in the same way that closing a book creates a waft of air. Then it grabs the clam in its mouth and, with a deft movement of the head and body, smashes it against a coral. The blows are so precise that, after a short time, the shell breaks apart. The fish then gobbles it down, swallowing the soft flesh and spitting out shattered shell fragments.

While scouring the reef for signs of tuskfish activity, one individual in particular caught the eye of assistant producer Rachel Butler and underwater cameraman Roger Munns.

‘We weren’t really sure we were going to see anything when we first found the tuskfish we nicknamed “Percy”, but within a few minutes he’d found a shell and set off to his favourite coral head, where he proceeded, with violent swings of his head, to smash it to bits. Although we knew what to expect, Rachel and I were both dumbfounded at his amazing behaviour.’