A goby and two shrimps

A goby and two shrimps living together. Footage collected during a study on the mutualistic relationship between gobioid fish and blind shrimp in the Southern Great Barrier Reef, investigating questions of partner specificity, the implications of partner choice on ecosystem resilience, and the behavior of gobioid fish and shrimp in formed partnerships.
An excerpt from my paper: "The shrimp makes its habitat in the permanently submerged nearshore region, using its claws to excavate a burrow in the sediment. The goby inhabits the burrow with the shrimp, using it for shelter while acting as a lookout for the shrimp, which has poor vision (Karplus et al. 2011)." Sometimes, as you can see, multiple shrimp share one burrow, as can more than one goby.
Gobies feed by picking tiny organisms out of the sand or by taking in mouthfuls of sand from near the burrow and filtering it through their gill rakers. My favorite fact about these adorable partners is that gobies have been known to find food from outside the burrow to bring back to their hardworking shrimp friends.

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