A VERY unusual new addition

[sinibotia]

I live very close to a river and the other day, during a particularly low tide, I went down to the edge of the river and found a lamprey sitting in the mud! Only 4 inches long or so- still an ammocete larva- so I threw him in a water bottle and into my fish tank with some other native minnows as a temporary resident. He won't be staying long- soon all of the fish will be going back where I found them. But for now, a really cool and fascinating addition to the tank! He behaves for all intents and purposes like a kuhli loach, mostly staying burried in the sand. But it's absolutely fascinating to look at the closest living thing we have to our earliest origins as vertebrates (even if lampreys don't quite make the cut).

 

[BLUEaquarium06]

Id love to see a picture of him

 

[sinibotia]

Id love to see a picture of him

The plan is to dig him up later today and post some pictures if I can get good ones! He's extremely elusive.

Oh, and for anyone concerned about lamprey's parasitic ways- as ammocete larvae, they're actually filter feeders. This little guy still has some time before he metamorphoses into a "pest", if you want to call him that(It's how local fisherman would think of him). I prefer to think of it as a valid evolutionary path that we didn't go down

Another cool lamprey fact is that, technically, they aren't fish or vertebrates, although not by much! They're called jawless fishes but, according to my biology of fishes professor, they're actually "proto-vertebrates" and not true fishes.

 

[CoeurSauvage]

Cool! I'd love to see him!


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[sinibotia]

He's near-impossible to photograph. I had to put him in a cup just to get any pictures at all. In the tank he buries himself like a kuhli loach.

 

[CoeurSauvage]

Wow! He's so cool. Are you going to keep him for awhile?


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[sinibotia]

Wow! He's so cool. Are you going to keep him for awhile?


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No, he's going back to the river very soon along with all of his tankmates (who also came from (a tributary of) the river), to make room for some shelldwelling cichlids. I've seen adult lampreys in the river pushing 30 inches, not to mention that while he's filter feeding it's difficult and expensive to feed him.

 

[CoeurSauvage]

Aww, Shellie's are so cool! I wish I could find some around here. But it good that you're letting them go, you don't want that lamprey sucking the life out of your other fish! Good luck with your new fishes!


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