An Alaskan bay bitterly contested by fishermen and miners has become the site of a landmark study on population dynamics — and the findings favor the fish. Published June 2 in Nature, the analysis of Bristol Bay salmon quantifies a common-sense tenet of population dynamics: Diversity produces resilience. Had the proposed Pebble Mine been built in earlier decades, it’s possible the bay’s sockeye... 

Seen in the right light, yellow reef fish become spotty pains in the tail fin. sciencenewsMembers of one damselfish species use facial patterns of speckles and swooshes to identify the fish species they regularly attack, researchers report in an upcoming issue of Current Biology. These markings show up only in ultraviolet light, says visual ecologist Ulrike Siebeck of the University of Queensland... 

A fresh look at forgotten fossils has revealed two new species of giant, filter-feeding fish that swam Earth’s oceans for 100 million years, occupying the ecological niche now filled by whales and whale sharks. Until now, that ancient niche was thought to be empty, and such fish to be a short-lived evolutionary bust. “We knew these animals existed, but thought they were only around for 20 million... 

While he may not want to suck your blood, the male fish seen above does sport spooky-looking fangs that have earned it the name Danionella dracula. Researchers at London’s Natural History Museum found several of the new species (bottom) in a tank of aquarium fish. Initially museum staff had thought the 0.7-inch-long (1.7-centimeter-long) creatures, caught in Myanmar (Burma), were part of an...