Evolutionary processes have adapted nektonic animals to interact efficiently with the water that surrounds them. Not all these adaptations serve the same purpose. This paper concentrates on reduction of drag due to friction in the boundary layer close to the body surface. Mucus, compliant skins, scales, riblets and roughness may influence the flow velocity gradient, the type of flow and the thickness of the boundary layer around animals, and may seriously affect their drag in a positive or negative way. The long-chain polymers found in mucus decrease the pressure gradient and considerably reduced drag due to friction. The effect is probably due to channelling of the flow particles in the direction of the main flow, resulting in a reduction of turbulence. Compliant surfaces could probably reduce drag by equalising and distributing pressure pulses. However, the existing evidence that drag reduction actually occurs is not convincing. There is no indication that instantaneous heating, reducing the viscosity in the boundary layer, is used by animals as a drag-reducing technique. Small longitudinal ridges on rows of scales on fish can reduce shear stress in the boundary by a maximum of 10% compared with the shear stress of a smooth surface. The mechanism is based on the impedance of cross flow under well-defined conditions. The effect has been visualized with the use of particle image velocimetry techniques. The function of the swords and spears of several fast, pelagic, predatory fish species is still enigmatic. The surface structure of the sword of a swordfish is shown to be both rough and porous. The height of the roughness elements on the tip of the sword is close to the critical value for the induction of a laminar-to-turbulent flow transition at moderate cruising speeds. A flow tank is described that is designed to visualize the effects of surface imperfections on flow in the boundary layer in direct comparison with a smooth flat wall. The flow in a 1 m long, 10 cm high and 1 cm wide channel is visualized by illuminating the particles in a thin laser light sheet. The first results show that a rough surface increases the shear stress in the boundary layer and makes it thinner. The function of the roughness on the sword of a swordfish is probably to reduce the total drag by generating premature turbulence and by boundary layer thinning, despite an increased friction over the surface of the sword. The function of the porous surface structures on the sword, and of the porous skins of sharks and of the castor oil fish, will probably be discovered soon using new particle image velocimetry techniques applied under strong magnification to visualize the local behaviour of the flow.