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Beware the testicle-eating fish:
A fisherman at a South New Jersey lake caught an exotic fish native to South America with human-like teeth and an overblown reputation for munching on male genitalia.
Ron Rossi caught a pacu -- a tropical freshwater fish typically found in the Amazon River -- in Swedes Lake on Sunday, according to WPVI.
Pacus gained a reputation as "testicle eating fish" after Jeremy Wade featured them on a 2011 episode of his Animal Planet show "River Monsters." Wade said Amazonian locals told him two men died after they had their testicles bitten off by a fish.
British tabloids picked up the story and it became an Internet sensation.
"I had heard of a couple of fishermen in Papua, New Guinea, who had been castrated by something in the water," Wade said at the time. "The bleeding was so severe that they died. The locals told me that this thing was like a human in the water, biting at the testicles of fishermen. They didn't know what it was."
...
As for how this Amazonian fish ended up in Jersey, the state's Department of Environmental Protection said the pacu in question likely belonged to a fish hobbyist. These fish are just a few inches long when they are typically purchased. When they reach maturity, however, they can be 3 feet long and more than 40 pounds, earning a reputation as "tank busters."
"Every once in a while, someone who has bought one of these fish realizes it has outgrown its welcome, gotten too big and they release it into some lake," department spokesperson Lawrence Hajna told The Huffington Post. "I'm sure that's what happened here. Any fish like this won't survive our winters because the waters get too cold."
Deep down you've always known there was a serious reason for being an aquaphobe.
Original Submission
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Friday June 26 2015, @03:17PM
We had a commercial tenant who couldn't pay rent and up and left. They left a whole lot of crap behind including a 90 gallon fish tank with among other fish, including two Oscars, two pacus. We tried getting rid of them but the problem was no one wants them, even fish and pet stores wouldn't take them (but they sell them). Pacus can get really big in captivity; they can grow upward of 750mm (30 inches) in captivity. We cared for them while we searched for a new owner. We were close to getting rid of them as another tenant's brother was a fish keeper. Too late, the tank heater failed after the heater in the building failed in the winter. The fish died from the cold. I felt bad but what can you do.
Some people get pets without ever thinking about the long term care.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Bot on Friday June 26 2015, @03:56PM
I gather it's not edible?
Account abandoned.
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Friday June 26 2015, @04:43PM
If you read the Wikipedia article, it is edible.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 27 2015, @04:29PM
If you read the Wikipedia article, it is edible.
But I didn't so it isn't?
(Score: 2) by arulatas on Friday June 26 2015, @04:58PM
Would you eat a fish that tasted like balls?
----- 10 turns around
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Friday June 26 2015, @06:14PM
People dumping them is a regular problem in Florida. You can see pacu around springs in the St John's River in Central Florida, and oscars are established enough to be a regular catch in canals in South Florida.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 27 2015, @01:39AM
Way to waste a fish bbq.