Humans often engage in mutually beneficial relationships out of necessity or convenience. Well, animals do the same too. That shouldn’t come as a surprise considering the fact that it’s all about survival of the fittest out in the wild. To preserve its well-being, the remora has learned to make friends with an animal that’s at the top of the food chain–the shark.
It’s unclear how long remoras and sharks have been coupled up, but the relationship between the two is still going strong today. Most people may not know remoras by name, but they’d probably recognize them as the little fish that cling onto sharks. Remoras literally stick by a shark’s side using the sucker-like organ that sits on top of their heads. It’s not at all uncommon to find multiple remoras attached to a single shark, but why would they take the risk of following around one of the most fearsome predators in the sea?
The relationship between remoras and sharks is clearly a case of opposites attract. The shark is strong, agile, and scary. It’s the apex predator of the sea, and no other animal poses a real threat to it. Remoras, on the other hand, are smaller scavengers that could be seen as food by all kinds of other sea creatures including bigger fish, dolphins, sea turtles, seals, large squid and octopus, and more. By clinging onto the shark, an animal that most other sea creatures fear, the remora is protected from anything that wants to make a meal out of it.
While protection is the primary reason that remoras have hung around sharks for thousands of years, they also get the side benefit of scoring a free meal once in a while. Remoras are happy eating the scraps of whatever the shark kills. In many cases, they’ve even consumed the shark’s feces for food.
What does the shark get from its annoying sidekick? Remoras can eat the parasites that burrow into the shark’s flesh. They help to keep the shark clean and healthy, and that’s why “Jaws” usually doesn’t mind his hovering buddy. If the remora makes a wrong move, however, it could end up as a small snack in no time.
