hag·fish

(hăg′fĭsh′)

n. pl. hagfish or hag·fish·es

Any of various elongated slimy marine fishes of the class Myxini (family Myxinidae), lacking jaws and vertebrae and having a sucking mouth with toothlike rasps, used for feeding on invertebrates and for burrowing into or scavenging other fish.

[hag + fish.]

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

hagfish

(ˈhæɡˌfɪʃ)

n, pl -fish or -fishes

(Animals) any eel-like marine cyclostome vertebrate of the family Myxinidae, having a round sucking mouth and feeding on the tissues of other animals and on dead organic material. Often shortened to: hag

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

hag•fish

(ˈhægˌfɪʃ)

n., pl. (esp. collectively) -fish, (esp. for kinds or species) -fish•es.

any eel-shaped jawless fish of the order Myxiniformes, having a round, sucking mouth and rasping tongue for boring into the flesh of other fishes.

[1605–15]

hag·fish

(hăg′fĭsh′)

Any of various jawless fish that resemble eels and may be related to the lampreys. Hagfish have several hearts, glands that produce slime, and tentacles around the mouth. They do not have eyes, a backbone, or a stomach. Hagfish often feed on dead or dying fish by boring into them and eating them from the inside.

The American Heritage® Student Science Dictionary, Second Edition. Copyright © 2014 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Noun

hagfish - eellike cyclostome having a tongue with horny teeth in a round mouth surrounded by eight tentacles; feeds on dead or trapped fishes by boring into their bodies

slime eels, hag

agnathan, jawless fish, jawless vertebrate - eel-shaped vertebrate without jaws or paired appendages including the cyclostomes and some extinct forms

family Myxinidae, Myxinidae - slime-producing marine animals: hagfishes

Myxine glutinosa - typical hagfish

eptatretus - a fossil hagfish of the genus Eptatretus

Myxinikela siroka - fossil hagfish of the Pennsylvanian period (c. 300 million years ago) that resembled modern hagfishes

Translations

lampreda

Mentioned in

References in periodicals archive

Scavengers such as sleeper sharks, eel-like hagfish, and other bony fish come to the scene--drawn by sensitive sensory organs, which detected the whale as it descended.

Fighting for scraps: discover the creatures that keep rotting corpses and other waste from covering the planet in heaps of filth

It's not hard to figure out how hagfish got their name, as they aren't exactly warm and fuzzy.

A hagfish by any other name would not smell as sweet

There has also been reports of lots of hagfish in the River Tyne Estuary.

Shore promises to be a big day at open contest

Those adorable creatures hagfish have spread their wings and are now appearing in the Wear.

Great for Scott as he wins yet again

To detect the presence of proteins antigenically similar to mammalian apical NHE isoforms in ancestral craniates, membrane proteins from Hagfish (Myxine glutinosa) and Skate (Raja erinacea) gills were immunoblotted with polyclonal antibodies made against NHE-2 (aa 260-280) and NHE-3 (aa 528-648).

Saturday's Sessions

Hagfish, Eptatretus spp., of the class Agnatha, family Myxinidae, are among the most primitive and unique of fishes.

Pacific hagfish, Eptatretus stouti, and black hagfish, E. deani: the Oregon Fishery and Port sampling observations, 1988-92

DEPOE BAY - A truck carrying 7,500 pounds of hagfish overturned on Highway 101 near Depoe Bay on Thursday afternoon, spilling thousands of the slimy purple creatures onto at least two passenger vehicles and the roadway, which was partly closed by the multivehicle pileup.

Oregon hagfish spill slimes cars, roadway

Aquaporins have been investigated in a wide variety of fish species, from the strictly marine osmoconforming hagfish to the highly euryhaline Mozambique tilapia Oreochromis mossambicus (Peters, 1852).

Water transport and functional dynamics of aquaporins in osmoregulatory organs of fishes

Synthetic fabrics such as nylon are derived from petroleum, notes Fudge, so studying hagfish threads may lead to renewable "green" materials for making all sorts of things.

Repellent slime has material virtues: hagfish excretions exhibit superior strength and flexibility

A team from the University of Guelph has become the first to make polymer-like films and fibres from solubilised proteins extracted from hagfish slime.

Hagfish slime reengineered into films, fibres

LAST ONE It looks just like one of I'm A Celeb's dreaded Bushtucker Trials, as Daily Mirror columnist Richard dunks himself in a cold tank of Hagfish to learn more about the amazing super powers of animals.

November 19 MONDAY