Elusive ‘noodlefish’ from uninhabited island found as a pet 3,500 miles away
On Tetepare, the largest uninhabited island in the South Pacific, researchers caught a slender, unknown fish while surveying the Hokata River.Accompanying the team were descendants of the original tribes that abandoned Tetepare more than a century ago, now serving as rangers and stewards of the island. They called the new creature a “noodlefish.”
It was photographed alive, then preserved and donated to a museum in Darwin, Australia.
This discovery was made in 2007. Experts hoped to collect more specimens to formally describe and publish research on the elusive species, but despite several trips and extensive surveys, no other noodlefish have ever been found on Tetepare, according to a study published July 17 in the peer-reviewed journal Zootaxa.
Then, in 2024, researcher I-Shiung Chen published a study describing a new “unusual” species and genus of “sleeper” goby, discovered nearly 3,500 miles across the Pacific Ocean in Taiwan.
Chen’s specimen, originally caught from the Hualien River in Jian Village, Taiwan, was obtained from a fisherman whose son was keeping it as a pet, according to the study.
Chen described the fish in his December study, published in Zootaxa, as being entirely “bloody red” in color and measuring just under 2 inches long.
Researcher Helen K. Larson said she immediately recognized the odd creature in Chen’s study as the elusive noodlefish from Tetepare.
By comparing the Tetepare specimen from 2007 with Chen’s formally described specimen, researchers have concluded they belong to the same “mysterious” species.
Additional studies are required to learn more about the freshwater species, particularly its “interesting distribution in two island localities separated by the vast waters of the Pacific ocean,” researchers said.
Researchers are currently in the field searching for noodlefish, Larson told McClatchy News.
Tetepare Island is part of the Solomon Islands.
The research team included Helen K. Larson, David Boseto, Aaron Jenkins and I-Shiung Chen. All photos were taken by Aaaron Jenkins.
This story was originally published July 25, 2025 at 5:02 PM with the headline "Elusive ‘noodlefish’ from uninhabited island found as a pet 3,500 miles away."
