Assistant Curator Natural History Andrew Stewart describes a recent specimen processed by the Fishes team – one of the more striking deep-water predators and relative to the barracouta (a.k.a. the Fisherman’s curse), a large oilfish called Ruvettus pretiosus. Read more
After an albatross specimen was collected on a Wellington beach and taken to Te Papa, curator Alan Tennyson and his colleagues were astounded to see a shark’s tail protruding from its neck.Read more
Recently, I published with my colleagues from Te Papa Fish Team and Massey University some interesting findings about a fantastic group of species: hagfishes. Those primitive deep-sea fishes repulse any predator attack using their slime. I present examples of how hagfish stop the attack from shark several times their sizes.Read more
On Tuesday 28 June, the Great White Shark debuted on his first film set, defrosted and ready for action. Andrew Stewart, Collection Manager Fishes managed the team in preparing the shark for its fixing process and dissection with great excitement of what could be discovered. Over the course of theRead more
This morning, our fish team went to a small boatshed in Breaker Bay on Wellington’s south coast to pick up a great white shark. Not your normal morning mission and a bittersweet one at that as these creatures are endagered animals and a protected species. The shark had been ensnaredRead more
As research scientist for the Marsden funded project on diversity of deep-sea fishes of New Zealand, I have to analyse hundreds of hours of video footage taken during our surveys. Sometimes, amazing creatures appear on the screen, often when you least suspect it. Here is a shot that really surprisedRead more
