Florida's New Invasive Species Is A 10-Foot Long River Monster

[marmar]

FORT LAUDERDALE (CBSMiami/AP) — Florida is already in a battle with dangerous and invasive species like the Burmese python, green iguana and lionfish and now there’s a new predator in the state called the arapaima. It is a fish that can grow up to 10 feet long and weigh hundreds of pounds.

A dead one recently washed ashore in Cape Coral’s Jaycee Park along the Caloosahatchee River, which runs from Lake Okeechobee west to the Gulf of Mexico.

The arapaima is native to the Amazon River in South America and is one of the world’s largest predatory fish. Its scales are said to be as impenetrable as armor. And it’s ugly, at least to most people.

“I think it’s kind of cool,” said Captain Josh Constantine, who has been fishing the waters near the Caloosahatchee River for more than 20 years, and has been a guide for his business, Caloosahatchee Cowboys Charters, for more than a decade. ...........(more)

https://miami.cbslocal.com/2021/03/17/florida-new-invasive-species-fish-arapaima-river-monster/

[mainer]

1. Those are said to be delicious

Amazing fish. I saw them in the Amazon (where they’re under threat) and they’re spectacular fish.

[dawg day]

2. Edible?

Also at that link, Florida man kills grandfather, cuts his ears off, hands them to cops. Family values... he and gramos were sharing a spliff.

[mainer]

6. Chefs prize it

https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/amazons-giant-prized-pirarucu-fish-now-on-dinner-plates-at-fanciest-restaurants-2120615

[superpatriotman]

3. I wonder which asshole brought this one here

Because ‘exotic’ pet aficionados have fucked this state with invasive non-native species.

[Baitball Blogger]

11. +1

[GoCubsGo]

4. Great. Just what they need.

How the hell did that thing get there?

[marble falls]

5. It followed the coast and bore an oblique right at Panama. After then it was just follow the signs.

But for a perspective: English Sparrows are invasive, as well as are horses, cows, earth worms, you and me ...

[hunter]

7. Modern horses evolved in North America about 1.1 to 1.2 million years ago...

... and crossed into Asia via the Siberian land bridge.

Horses became extinct in North America about the same time humans arrived, possibly by a combination of climate change and human predation.

This explains the success of horses in North America as a re-introduced wild species.

[marble falls]

8. After a "millions" of year absence, it was not "re-inroduced" it was invasive.

[hunter]

10. By most accounts humans have been in North America for about 30,000 years.

Horses were here much longer.

Yeah, I know, there are huge conflicts about wild horses in the American West.

I tend to be more concerned about all the gun-toting feral Christians.

[denbot]

9. Not me Kimosabe..

[taxi]

12. This was a dead fish found along the shore.

From the end if the story, and as originally reported on March 4th in the Sun Sentinel:

How the dead arapaima got to the Caloosahatchee River remains a mystery. There’s a chance someone had it as a pet and released it into the wild.

Or, Constantine suggests, “someone could have brought it here already dead and let it go just to start some [expletive]. There’s no telling. We don’t know.”

https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-ne-ss-prem-arapaima-invasive-monster-fish-florida-20210304-qmni4zjpwjgntaxa7q4l3n3wom-story.html?outputType=amp&utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Don%27t%20Miss&utm_content=5601614893888&__twitter_impression=true