Shows like Blue Planet<\/em> depict the wonderful variation of life in the ocean, but when it comes to conservation efforts, it\u2019s the unattractive fish that need our support the most, a study carried out by an international team of researchers has found. Species with drab colouring and elongated bodies were found to be least aesthetically-pleasing, but they were also the most at threat of extinction<\/a> and more at risk of exploitation by fisheries.<\/p>\n

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\u201cBright, colourful fish species with rounder bodies tended to be rated as the most beautiful,\u201d said co-author Prof Nicolas Mouquet<\/a>, of the University of Montpellier, France. \u201cI find the word \u2018ugly\u2019 too strong, but that\u2019s obviously more catchy than \u2018less attractive\u2019, which we use in our study. This is why the examples [of unattractive fish] do not correspond to what readers have in mind \u2013 if you Google \u2018ugly fish\u2019 you\u2019ll find very different images to those here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Among the unattractive reef fish determined by the new study were the bluefish (Pomatomus saltatrix<\/em>), the\u00a0bocaccio rockfish (Sebastes paucispinis<\/em>) and the\u00a0white steenbras\u00a0(Lithognathus lithognathus<\/em>).<\/p>\n
\u201cThese three fishes are among the less beautiful species in our dataset, and they are threatened and of some commercial interest \u2013 which often means that they are over-exploited,\u201d said Mouquet.<\/p>\n
To determine the ecological importance of different species, Mouquet and the team compared the fishes\u2019 traits to determine how unique they were. Things like body size, habitat, food and preferred temperature were all considered, and it was found that the more unique species actually turned out to be the more plain ones.<\/p>\n
$\"""\"$ <\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>Our opinion of animals\u2019 attractiveness relates to our overall interest in a species, which the authors of the new paper say could influence where we put our conservation efforts and donations. The aesthetic bias also affects scientific research, as people are drawn to study brightly coloured reef fish \u2013 a previous study showed publications are overwhelmingly biased towards yellow fishes<\/a>.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s hoped that by making people aware of the impacts of beauty biases, more research, support and conservation can go into these ecologically important species. And, the deep learning algorithm developed by Mouquet and the team could go on to help us understand the impact of our aesthetic judgements on threatened birds, mammals, reptiles and others.<\/p>\n
Read more about marine life:<\/strong><\/p>\n
The blobfish: A bloated guide to the world\u2019s ugliest animal (and what they really look like)<\/a><\/li>\n
Fish do feel pain, study confirms<\/a><\/li>\n
11 dazzling images of the UK\u2019s vibrant ocean wildlife<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul><\/body><\/html>\n
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By Amy Barrett Published: Tuesday, 07 June 2022 at 12:00 am Shows like Blue Planet depict the wonderful variation of life in the ocean, but when it comes to conservation efforts, it\u2019s the unattractive fish that need our support the most, a study carried out by an international team of researchers has found. Species with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":14091,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"3"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/06\/ugly-fish-are-under-threat-of-extinction-and-need-saving.jpg",1200,800,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/06\/ugly-fish-are-under-threat-of-extinction-and-need-saving-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/06\/ugly-fish-are-under-threat-of-extinction-and-need-saving-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/06\/ugly-fish-are-under-threat-of-extinction-and-need-saving-768x512.jpg",768,512,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/06\/ugly-fish-are-under-threat-of-extinction-and-need-saving-1024x683.jpg",800,534,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/06\/ugly-fish-are-under-threat-of-extinction-and-need-saving.jpg",1200,800,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/42\/2022\/06\/ugly-fish-are-under-threat-of-extinction-and-need-saving.jpg",1200,800,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Amy Barrett Published: Tuesday, 07 June 2022 at 12:00 am Shows like Blue Planet depict the wonderful variation of life in the ocean, but when it comes to conservation efforts, it\u2019s the unattractive fish that need our support the most, a study carried out by an international team of researchers has found. Species with…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/14090"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14091"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14090"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcsciencefocus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14090"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}