Cymothoa exigua

A new paracitic louse has been dicsovered off the coast of California. This particular parasite crawls into the gills of a host fish, attatches itself to the tongue of that host, sucks the blood out of the tongue and replaces itself as a new tongue. How sick is that? The cool thing is that this is the only recorder parasite that replaces an organ wthout any further harm to the fish aside from the loss of that organ. Id post pics but its pretty gross. google Cymothoa exigua

-Rob Hamilton