The Mola Mola fish, also known as the Ocean Sunfish, is extremely large.. The biggest sunfish ever recorded was 12 feet tall, 11 feet long and weighed approximately three tons! Although these big fish look a little scary due to their size, they don’t eat humans. Their diets mainly consist of jellyfish, though it’s a little impractical due to the low nutritional value compared to how big they are and how much energy they need to stay alive. These fish are pelagic, meaning they live deeper than a lot of common fish such as whales and sharks, but aren’t deep enough that they reach a place of darkness. Mola Mola fish lack a swim bladder, which is a gas filled organ most fish have to control buoyancy. Instead, they have lighter cartilage and a layer of subcutaneous jelly that causes them to be naturally buoyant. They appear to be awkward swimmers due to their large fin that is so closely connected with their bodies. They might be huge, but the adults have no natural predators. In other words, nothing eats this fish when it’s fully grown. Seals, killer whales, and some dolphin species have been found biting chunks out of the fish and hitting them around for entertainment, but that’s all. However, Bluefin Tuna and Mahi Mahi eat their young. Out of their average 200kg, their brains only weigh less than five grams; they have super small brains for their size. Not only are these fish ginormous, they also aren’t very smart. It’s quite hard for them to survive off of jellyfish but they do somehow. Also, you would think they would come closer to extinction given that they’re “vulnerable”, however they reproduce in the 300 millions. The females lay over 300 million eggs each breeding cycle, making it statistically impossible for the fish to become extinct. There was an incident in 2005 where a boy was killed by a Mola Mola fish, but not for the reason you would think. It jumped out of the water, landing on the boy, and due to its sheer mass, it crushed the poor child. Although this is a rare incident, it has happened more than it should. Overall, I dislike this fish quite a bit and I believe that when the population inevitably grows back up, I think we should figure out a way to utilize them for something.
