They swallow their prey whole, and they don’t have large gill slits to vent out water in their mouth, so they have secondary set of jaws to pull food into the throat.
If you really want to get impractical, we breath and eat through the same tube, and that causes all kinds of problems.
Yes.* They’ll close off their gills and open their mouths, which creates a vacuum and sucks the food deeper into the mouth, then they close their mouths and open their gills to flush the water out but keep the food.
Morays on the other hand, have two little holes on the sides of their neck, and those are the exits for their gills. That’s why they always look like they are gasping or yawning; they are trying to force more water over their gills.
*There are a couple different structures for biting and swallowing food in the fish world, but a lot of fish simply open their big mouths and suck in nearby prey.
Ok but what evolutionary purpose does this have? It seems just impractical at best
Evolution isn’t a directed process, so there’s no “purpose”. I, a male, have nipples. What evolutionary purpose does that have?
They swallow their prey whole, and they don’t have large gill slits to vent out water in their mouth, so they have secondary set of jaws to pull food into the throat.
If you really want to get impractical, we breath and eat through the same tube, and that causes all kinds of problems.
Can’t wait until we develop another set of teeth too
We already do, and that causes problems, so we invented dentists to yank them out.
So does the venting water, like, pull food down the throat in other fish?
Yes.* They’ll close off their gills and open their mouths, which creates a vacuum and sucks the food deeper into the mouth, then they close their mouths and open their gills to flush the water out but keep the food.
Morays on the other hand, have two little holes on the sides of their neck, and those are the exits for their gills. That’s why they always look like they are gasping or yawning; they are trying to force more water over their gills.
*There are a couple different structures for biting and swallowing food in the fish world, but a lot of fish simply open their big mouths and suck in nearby prey.