Question: have you ever seen a blobfish and why do they look like a blob of blubber? What are they made from?

James Bell answered on 26 Jun 2014:

I haven’t seen a living blowfish – very few people have.

Blobfish are like they are because it allows them to float motionless in the water and not expend very much energy in swimming. They are primarily a flexible, jelly-like (gelatinous) squishy lump of flesh and their density is pretty close to seawater.

Body materials like bone and muscle are very dense and would make the animal sink – hence it has a greatly reduced skeleton. Strong skeletons are also important for movement and most deep sea species don’t really move all that much so they don’t need well-developed skeletons