Gulf-of-Mexico Fringed Sole

Found singly, partially buried, in or on soft bottoms of the reef. This highly compressed fish buries itself beneath the sand, exposing only its eye and tubular nostril. Moves extremely fast when disturbed and is difficult to detect when it resettles. There is a rare black phase where the bars are barely visible.

Flatfish, Soles and Flounders are placed in their families by location of their eyes. Their are both left eye and right eye dominant families.
Flatfish bury themselves in sand to hide from predators and use their eyes as periscopes as these can rotate 180 degrees.
During pelagic larval stage these fish are not flat but become so as they grow, their bodies flatten, and one eye migrates across the head next to the other eye.