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Photo of the Day

March 14, 2008

 

Photo: Patterned boxfish swimming

Striped Boxfish, Tukangbesi Islands, Indonesia, 2005

Photograph by Tim Laman

A dizzying array of dots and squiggles decorates a striped boxfish (Ostracion solorensis) gliding by a coral reef near Indonesia's Tukangbesi Islands. Boxfish, also known as trunkfish or cowfish, are known for their distinctive boxy profiles and for the bonelike, six-sided plates that cover much of their bodies and protect them from predators.

(Photo shot on assignment for, but not published in, "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish: Why Are Coral Reefs So Colorful?" May 2005, National Geographic magazine)

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