Nomally fish have an opening on thir snout called a naris. A naris is essentially the fish's nose and is packed with olfactory receptors. Water enters the naris, and leaves through a posterior naris. Some fish have this posterior naris in their mouth, where it is refered to as a choanae. The water will then enter the gills and exit the fish body that way. The lungifsh has a special case of Naris however, where both the posterior and rostral ends are within the mouth. It has been highly debated whether or not this may be refered to as a choanae.
African lungfish live in very wet areas which are prone to completely drying up. During this dry period, the lungfish will burrow into the ground and make a chamber for itself. It will then fill this chamber with large amounts of mucus, forming a coccoon like structure. The lungfish can live in thi cacoon fo months at a time, until another wet period begins. During these wet periods is when the lungfish nest and lay their eggs. The female will create a burrow and lay its eggs in a chamber, which will be filled with decaying plant material. The male lungfish guard the egg chamber. Due to the need for african lungfish to breath actual air, and not soley oxygen from water, while guarding these eggs the males will develop pelvic gills. Pelvic gills work in the opposite ways of respiritory gills. These gills will expell oxygen from the males body and oxygenate the surrounding water. In thi way the embryo's within the eggs will be able to breath more easily. The male lungfish will only have to surface for a gulp of air about once per hour.
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