gulper

Gulper is a noun derived from gulp and is used to refer to a person or animal that gulps liquids or food quickly. It can describe someone with a voracious appetite or a habit of rapid swallowing. In everyday language, the term is informal and descriptive rather than technical.

In zoology, the word is often associated with the gulper eel, Eurypharynx pelecanoides, and related pelican eels in the family Eurypharyngidae. These deep-sea fishes are notable for an extremely distensible mouth and throat, which allow them to engulf prey much larger than their bodies. They typically have elongated, ribbon-like bodies with small fins and a relatively short tail, adaptations suited to life in dark, high‑pressure environments. Gulper eels occur in tropical and subtropical oceans and are found at substantial depths, well below the photic zone. Their feeding approach relies on rapid expansion of the mouth and pharynx to swallow prey in a single gulp, which may include small fish, crustaceans, and gelatinous organisms. Because encounters with these animals are rare, much about their reproduction and population dynamics remains poorly understood. They are not targeted by commercial fisheries, and potential threats are limited primarily to disturbances of deep-sea habitats and bycatch.

Overall, gulper serves as a versatile term: in everyday use, it describes rapid gulping by a person or animal, while in scientific contexts it signals a distinctive feeding adaptation seen in certain deep-sea eel species.