Sometimes when we are underwater, we see cooperation between fish from the same species hunting for food. When I see that kind of behaviour, I think, now that is an interesting cooperative skill. Nevertheless, when we see fish or other animals from different families cooperating to hunt for food together, that is unusual and is well worth watching.
When we were in Hawaii I was somewhat surprised to see a white mouthed moray eel team up with a tivoli to hunt for food.
Now in the middle of the day to see a free-swimming moray eel is fairly uncommon. But to see a free-swimming moral eel hunting with another species of fish is even more unlikely, and certainly is interesting — at least to me. I watched this pair swim together and chase several smaller fish into holes in the reef. I did not see them have any success in hunting. But I could imagine that a ray which could easily get into relatively small holes in the reef could be a very helpful hunting buddy. I could easily imagine the ray either catching and eating a small fish in the hole, or chasing out the small fish into the awaiting jaws of the tivoli. Of course the opposite could be true. the tivoli could chase a smaller fish back to the reef and into the awaiting jaws of the moray eel.
Similarly, on several occasions I have seen snappers hunt with southern rays. The first time I saw that behaviour was on a shark dive in Playa del Carmen. We were waiting for the sharks to come in when the first pair through the dive site was a southern ray and snapper apparently hunting for scraps. I was just hoping that I was not part of the scraps. Now I have seen the benefit of these partnerships between rays and snappers on several occassions. The ray stirs up the bottom looking for food and the snapper gets the left-overs that squirt out the gills of the ray. I have seen southern rays feeding with a snapper in Cayman Brac, Belize, and Mexico. I suspect this kind of cooperative hunting goes on all over. Regardless of how often it may occur, I still never get tired of observing it.
