Volunteers of the Cornwall Wildlife Trust were on a seashore marine training day when they came across the creature in a Helford River rockpool.
The giant goby is generally a southern European fish, and this particular sample may well have been a young one, as the creature can grow to 27cm or so.
After examination by the group’s trainer Doug Herdson, who worked for many years as a fish expert at Plymouth’s National Marine Aquarium, it was placed back in the rockpool to await freedom accorded by the next incoming tide.
Giant gobies are protected under Schedule 5 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.
Established all over the world, gobies come in many sub-species.
Usually small, slim and sometimes scaleless, they are found both on tropical reefs and along shores in more temperate seas.
Carnivorous, gobies are mainly bottom-dwellers, with pelvic fins fusing at the body to form a suction cup with which to hang on to coral, rocks, sand or mud.
They are often interestingly coloured and are a popular sighting for divers. They are also commonly spotted by seashore walkers in rockpools, due to their predilection for inshore sites.
The giant goby found in the Helford was in a pool located particularly high up toward the tide line. Giant gobies can enjoy a freshwater input, sometimes available in upper rockpools.
Such pools are exposed the longest, but the gobies can withstand the high temperatures generated by long exposure to the sun.
While there, they will feed on worms, small fish or insects which land in the pool.
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