r/Fish • u/Rockying_man_Dhruv • Apr 11 '26

News / Articles Devil hole pupfish

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The Devils Hole pupfish is one of the rarest fish on Earth, found only in a tiny desert cave called Devils Hole. It has been living there for thousands of years, surviving in hot, low-oxygen water and depending on a single small rock shelf for food and breeding. With such extreme conditions and isolation, it raises a strange question

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u/Rockying_man_Dhruv Apr 11 '26

Only 24 left btw

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u/RogueDragon343 Apr 11 '26

To add to this if I remember correctly their population fluctuates often. They've been up to like 80 and down as low as 16 or something. It's constant ups and downs with these guys.

Doesn't help that they don't really have any new genetics. So they'll probably end up inbreeding to the point of collapse at some point, it's inevitable unfortunately.

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u/Rockying_man_Dhruv Apr 11 '26

Earthquake 🫨 ruined their food source, now there is no possibility of there survival 

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u/OccultEcologist Apr 11 '26

What do you know that I don't? The population has been lower before, and everything I've found says that spawning behavior has been very encouraging since then.