“Cat got your tongue?”
“Uh, no. It’s way grosser.”
This is the most disgusting thing I’ve ever seen. And I’ve seen some awful things. I had a girlfriend whose dog would eat so much of its own shit that it would puke it up, AND THEN EAT IT AGAIN. But this? This is beyond comparison.
The tongue eating louse, known in Latin’s dead tongue – and the irony there is incredible – as the Cymothoa exigua, is pretty much the worst thing that can happen to a fish, save for being caught and eaten (because that’s our job, Cymo).
So here’s what this horrible little creature does: after squeezing in through the unlucky host fish’s gills, it makes its way up the throat before latching onto the tongue, which it proceeds to slowly eat, and eventually replaces. That’s right. It hangs out, latched onto the mangled stub of the tongue and, in the case of the rose snapper, becomes the fish’s new tongue. Although it stays on long enough only in the rose snapper’s snap hole to become the tongue, it still invades other species long enough to feast off their mouth blood and just be generally disgusting.
They are interesting little creatures, though, despite their disgustingness. They’re protandrous hermaphrodites, kind of like RuPaul, only not at all. Instead of just throwing on a dress and looking fantastic in it, the tongue eating louse goes the whole nine yards and signs up for its own gender reassignment surgery. Starting off life as a male, when it lands on a set of delicious gills and begins to worm its way up, it puts out some serious singles bar vibe and attracts another louse, which hangs out in the corner sipping vodka tonics until the time is right. Then the first louse changes sexes and begins its Journey to the Center of the Tongue where, instead finding of glittering caverns full of diamonds and vast, dark seas, it stabs two of its seven modified, stiletto-like jaws into the tongue. Then the other five share the duties of both holding on and sucking the fish’s blood. Of course, the second louse, now sufficiently emboldened by vodka tonics and lusting desperately after the scent of a now-woman-louse, makes his move. He scores big-time, impregnates the tongue-sucker, then ditches the scene and never tells his friends that he picked up a hermaphrodite at The Rose Snapper.
But the pregnant louse loves her new digs: a good tongue to chew on, safe from any predators, and free cable when the fishermen are around (get it? Fishermen? Cable? Fishing lines? Nice). She hangs out there, slowly killing the afflicted fish’s tongue until it atrophies completely. Then, scientists believe, when the host is schooling with other fish – no doubt trying in vain to tell them that its tongue has been replaced by a horrible parasite – it cuts its brood pouch loose, hoping to get her kids out into some other mouth, where they can carry on her blood line.
Then she cuts her losses and either lets go or gets swallowed, which would be difficult for the fish to do without a tongue. The fish, now tongueless, eventually dies. Classic tongue eating louse, right?
Want to see more Crazy Creatures of the Week? Yeah you do. They’re all so weird!
The Coconut Crab: It’ll eat your cat.
The Bobbit Worm: Tremors, without Kevin Bacon.
The Sawfish: It’s a shark and a crocodile. It’s a sharkodile!
Nomura’s Jellyfish: Giant sea-boogers.
The Blobfish: The saddest lump of living ooze you’ve ever seen.
The Oarfish: It’s long! It’s strong! It’s down to get the friction on!
