ID cutiepatootie burrfish and eel/catfish/Idon'tevenknow fish

[Betta132]

Went to a little educational thing with some native Gulf fish. The signs were good overall, but a couple of things hadn't been labeled.
The first picture is of a cute baby burr/puffer type fish. He was in a tank that held seahorses and some assorted little baby fish, although most of the babies were hiding. The tank sign explained that these were things that lived in the seagrass- seahorses and baby fish. I know he's a burrfish, pufferfish, or something of the sort... I'm just wondering if anyone knows exactly what kind. He was adorable! Little bumblebee-sized stickerburr fishy, just about an inch long.
I apologize for the bad picture of him... He was moving a lot, nonstop, wagging his tail all over the place and not sitting still long enough for my cell phone to get a good pic. His burrs were almost square at the bases, oddly...

The other three are- I have no clue what. I thought it was an eel when I saw its face, but it doesn't have teeth and the body shape is wrong. It's not a catfish, it doesn't have whiskers and the mouth isn't as fleshy. Its mouth is kind of like the mouth on a bass, and as you can see it has those odd feelers on its underside. It was mostly just hiding, but now and then it came out and felt around in the sand with its feelers. Any clue what it is? It's maybe six-seven inches long...

 

[fishhuman]

Do you have better pictures please

 

[fishhuman]

Coral catfish maybe

 

[Betta132]

These are the only pictures I have... He was shy and I only had my phone.
It's not a catfish. Like I said, it doesn't have whiskers and the mouth is wrong.

 

[fishhuman]

Could it be a sculpin

 

[Betta132]

Nope. Body shape is wrong, sculpin are spinier, and the sculpins have wide pectoral fins. Like I said, this guy didn't seem to have pectoral fins at all, just those feelers.

 

[LukFox]

I am on mobile so the pic I am looking at is an inch wide, but maybe look up lizardfish, family Synodontidae.

Edit: Pic just loaded right, just saw those neat feelers. Don't know what it is.

 

[Betta132]

It didn't have a mouth quite that large and I couldn't see any teeth, but that shape is pretty close- though I don't think my thingy had a dorsal fin. It hovered around instead of sitting, kind of like a Hector's goby...

 

[Betta132]

Anybody else know what that weird eel fella is?

 

[Shallow Reef]

I came across this in my book and looks like something from the lizardfish family. To be honest need more of a close up as its hard for us to tell.

 

[Bongo Shrimp]

Gulf Hake (Urophycis cirrata) or a very close relative. Hard to tell without closer pics.

 

[Mike Ordner]

First one is a spiny burrfish. Second one looks like a lizard fish, there are a couple of species here. Cannot tell from that picture.

 

[Betta132]

Gulf Hake (Urophycis cirrata) or a very close relative. Hard to tell without closer pics.

Yes! That's it!

Thanks, I had no clue what I was looking at. I've never seen anything like that, and now I can see why. It's a game sort of fish instead of a reef sort of fish.

 

[Bongo Shrimp]

Yeah it's more of a deeper water scavenger. Not something most reef oriented people recognize. Cool fish though. Love the weird split barbels.

 

[Betta132]

Curious- how did you know what it was? Have you caught them before or something?

 

[Bongo Shrimp]

Nope. I just look at key characteristics plus the location and look around. I knew from the pics it must have been a deeper scavenger and I have seen fish like it on the live feed of the NOAA submersible and in other deep sea shows. I have seen so many ocean shows, documentaries and have so many books that I can get a good idea in my head. Then check the books. Actually I found this one on an iPhone fish ID app.