While I am enjoying myself on my much needed vacation (at least I hope I am enjoying myself) we are going to learn another interesting fact about a crazy ocean fish.  If you are anything like me then you may be familiar with the freshwater sunfish, which is a small fish that have provided children hours and hours of entertainment.  If this is your idea of a sunfish then today’s fact should impress you.  The Ocean Sunfish isn’t related to the freshwater kind.

By looking at the picture you will see one of the biggest differences between these two species of fish.  The freshwater sunfish that I am use to seeing in Ontario are about 9 inches long and weigh less than a pound.  On the other side of the proverbial coin is the Ocean Sunfish (also known as the Mola mola) which can be as long as 14 feet and weigh about 5000 pounds. Imagine your kids face when they are sitting on the dock at your cottage and they pull up a 5000 pound sunfish! Just to put that into perspective, that is about the weight of a small pickup truck.

As you can understand, the ocean sunfish is the largest bony fish on the planet.  Fish such as sharks and rays are cartilaginous fish so they don’t count.  Interestingly enough the Mola mola can be as tall as they are long which gives them a rather circular appearance.  This gigantic fish feed mainly on jellyfish but will also feed on small fish and microscopic plant matter floating around in the water.  Unfortunately, the ocean sunfish has a small mouth, which is odd considering the size of the animal.  In order to feed with this beak-like mouth the Mola mola will actually suck the food in and then it spit out over and over again.  This allows the large sunfish to tear apart its food so it can easily eat the smaller pieces.  That might be gross but you have to admit, that is pretty clever.  Just for fun, the next time you are on a date, I want you to try this feeding technique.  Let me know how long the date lasts!

Ocean Sunfish Fast Fact: When this sunfish first hatches it is about one-tenth of an inch long.  Now I want you to think about this for a second. This is a fish that can end up being 14 feet long and starts out smaller than an inch.  Impressive!  Even more impressive is the fact that the Mola mola will weigh 60 million times more as an adult then it did when it was born.  Just so you know, most of us don’t even weigh 30 times more than we did when we were born! If I were a Ocean Sunfish I would weigh about 540 million pounds right now. Don’t you just hate that extra holiday weight! Well I am off to call Weight Watchers so have a good one!