This unique fish, that walks on its hands, was declared an endangered species in 1996, and only intense scientific research has saved its life.

But its near extinction could be ringing the warning bells about much wider and more serious environmental problems.

There's only one place where the Spotted handfish has been found. In the Derwent Estuary and a few adjoining bays near Hobart in Australia.

Originally called the walking fish, it was one of the first fish documented from Australian waters, and there used to be plenty of them.

By 1996, their numbers had declined to such an extent that they were declared an endangered species, the first Australian marine species to be threatened with extinction.

So scientists from CSIRO, Australia's Science Research Agency, began to investigate a small colony, identifying individual fish through their unique spot formations.

They took several fish back to the laboratory and for the first time, handfish were bred in captivity. But the question was, would they survive in the wild?

The handfish's habits of sitting still for long periods and laying their eggs on the bottom may make them easy targets for predators, pollution and silt.

But the main culprit was thought to be the Northern Pacific Sea Star. The Sea Stars arrived in their thousands, about the same time as the handfish numbers began to decline.

At first it was thought they were eating the handfish eggs, but then scientists discovered it was these tulip-like structures the handfish laid their eggs around that were being eaten.

So they created a plastic alternative, and it worked. In one underwater colony, the handfish used 49 plastic sticks as nests, compared to only five egg masses, found around natural sea tulips. The scientitsts are now hoping that they can increase handfish numbers by giving them more plastic sticks to lay their eggs around and by releasing captive bred fish.

But scientists aren't convinced that this is the only danger to the handfish. They are also concerned that sediment and pollution from urban and industrial developments in the area may also be to blame. The decline in the handfish could also be an indication of wider ecological problems in the estuary.

The long-term fate of the spotted handfish is still unsure, but hopefully science will help prevent the loss of this unique Australian fish.