Wild Facts

Every now and again you have a week where it just makes blogging so incredibly rewarding.  Earlier this week, Larissa over at Reef Botanicals presented Wild Facts with the Sunshine Award.  Just after that our beloved Animal Facts Blog was featured on Daily Planet.  Now, I find out that my favourite cat, Sparkle over at http://www.sparklecat.com has presented Wild Facts with the Superior Scribbler Award. I wanted to thank Sparkle the furry feline (and her human, Janiss) for being so kind and nominating Wild Facts for this prestigious award. As well, I recommend all of you to go and check out Sparkle’s website and see how a cat really thinks!

I had so much fun writing about the Pelican Eel yesterday that I thought I would keep the fish theme going.  We are ending the week with a very invasive but interesting fish called the Snakehead Fish! The Snakehead is native to Africa and Asia, however, populations of this deadly fish have been introduced into North America where they are causing Government Agencies to be concerned.  In fact, these fish are so deadly that they were referred to as “Fishzilla” in a recent documentary on National Geographic.

All right, what is so deadly about these ugly looking fish? Well, it is a top level predator which means it has no natural enemies, which probably has to do with the shark-like teeth, aggressive behaviour and the ability to survive anywhere.  The introduction of these fish into North American lakes are causing major concerns for fisherman and regulators alike since they have the ability to decimate local fish populations.  These fish will stop at nothing!  They are like locusts of the fish world feeding on other fish, crustaceans, plants, basically anything they can get their teeth on.  What makes these fish even more difficult to manage is the fact that when they are finished with a lake or if the lake dries up, they just move to a new lake.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that these pesky fish are able to “walk” on land.  Yeah, you read that right!  I will wait while you take that in……………All right, now that you have tossed that thought around in your head, I will continue to explain.  You see, the Snakehead is capable of breathing atmospheric oxygen which allows it to survive out of the water for about 4 days.  This adaptation obviously gives them an edge and allows them to wriggle across land to a brand new, productive, home.  They have evolved this feature as a result of the natural habitat in China.  It is a regular occurrence for their beloved watery homes to dry up so they needed to adapt in order to survive.  You can see why American and Canadian officials are worried about this little fish setting up shop in North America.  If this issue is not addressed than our fisheries could be in jeopardy.

If you would like to read more then I recommend checking out this article on the Department of Fisheries and Oceans website.

Not Welcomed in Canada: Preventing a Northern Snakehead Invasion

I always thought we would have to worry about space aliens invading Canada but I think this fish might be more deadly than some cute, green, martian.