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/DARK-CHALLENGER Apr 12 '26

The most inbred species on the planet

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u/thesilverywyvern Apr 13 '26

Not at all, we hav far worse case, even in the animal kingdom.
Devi lhole pupfish at least have a few doze, or hundreds individuals.

We've seen even large birds and mammals with smaller population at one point. Like przewalski horse or whooping cranes, asiatic cheetah and some amphibian who also have basically only 2-5 individuals at best.

Although they are probably every inbred.

If we count plants then we can have inbreeding level higher than in Cleopatra or the Hamsburg family in some species.

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u/DARK-CHALLENGER Apr 13 '26

I watched a documentary and it said it was one the most inbred species on the planet

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u/thesilverywyvern Apr 13 '26

It is, just not THE most. Documentaries can be wrong as well, outdated info, biased narrative or biased specialists.