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Fish on the wing

Steve Leonard watches flying fish from a speedboat as they glide over the surface of the water. Flying fish have one of the most extreme forms of escape known to any fish. Flying fish have evolved extraordinarily long pectoral fins. The fins do not flap but are used to glide instead. Their tail drives them along like an outboard motor and they even seem able to steer once they are in the air. The tail is so powerful that they can glide for up to 100 metres. To a predator, it is like a vanishing act. Flying fish are perhaps the most extraordinary bony fish of all. It just goes to show that anything can happen in the pressure cooker that is the crowded seas of life.

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