Can't say I caught this one, but rather it made quite a 'landing' on the Catalina flying fish tour boat we were on last Friday evening. It flew about 100 feet before turning towards the 40 million candlepower light then right past the tour guide! Quite spectacular, never seen one up close before. Quite beautiful, very big eyes, kind of like a mackerel with wings.
The tour guide said they have two defense mechanisms, one that they can escape the water and fly away from predators (the rumble of the tour boat engines was the predator that night) and secondly they can release their horrible smelling mucas membrane as a last ditch effort to avoid being eaten -- which it did. Unfortunately, that also destroys their immunity from water-borne disease, therefore, they kept this fish for displaying afterwards since it would die anyway.
The tour guide said they have two defense mechanisms, one that they can escape the water and fly away from predators (the rumble of the tour boat engines was the predator that night) and secondly they can release their horrible smelling mucas membrane as a last ditch effort to avoid being eaten -- which it did. Unfortunately, that also destroys their immunity from water-borne disease, therefore, they kept this fish for displaying afterwards since it would die anyway.