This pacu was caught in the Hudson River near Albany, New York.
From the Albany Times-Union:
A South American fish sometimes called the “vegetarian piranha” got hooked by an angler in the Hudson River over the weekend, according to the state Department of Environmental Conservation.
The fish, called a pacu, is a cousin to the infamous flesh-eating predator, but instead eats plants and is not a threat to humans or other animals. It likely got into the river when someone dumped out the fish from a home aquarium.
Albany resident Steve Oathout said he was fishing off the Watervliet bike path Saturday evening when he caught the unusual flat fish, which was gray with a red underbelly. He took a picture and released the fish, which was about 16 inches long and weighed three pounds.
Reports to the DEC of pacus, which are widely available in aquarium shops, being caught in Hudson and Mohawk rivers average about one a year, DEC spokeswoman Lori Severino said.
The pacu looks similar to the piranha, but is larger and can grow to about the size of a turkey in its native habitat of Brazil. The pacu does not share the razor sharp teeth of its cousin.
But the piranha and the pacu have something in common — neither fish can survive the colder waters of upstate New York in the winter.
From my own forays into pet shops, I can tell you that pacus are much more commonly available than one might assume.
They are usually not regulated in the same way that the piranhas are, so a shop can sell them with little government oversight.
Of course, they get much larger than any species of piranha, and they quickly can outgrow their tanks.
I remember seeing a huge pacu in a 200 gallon tank at a pet shop in Parkersburg, West Virginia. I marveled at its size, but I was even more impressed with the 18-inch plecostmus that was resting along the side of the tank. I had two 4-inch plecos, and I had no idea they could reach such sizes. (I was but an ignorant child in those days, and the big pleco and my small ones may have been different species.)
But I see why it is not unusual for fishermen to catch pacus in North American rivers during the summer.
They outgrow their tanks, or in this bad economy, their owners are forced to get rid of their pets. There aren’t many fish rescues out there, so they pull an Joy Adamson. The dump their fish in the nearest large body of water.
Many fish have been introduced in this fashion, but with tropical species like the pacu, they aren’t going to do well in temperate climates during the winter.
But when they are released in tropical and subtropical rivers– which we have in this country– well, the results could be quite different.
Florida is full of bizarre introduced species. Hawaii is, too, but to a somewhat lesser degree. That’s because Hawaii has very strict import laws, and it’s a series of islands.
I’m not saying that Hawaii has no introduce species problems. It has plenty, but these are nothing compared to those of Florida.
Florida is connected to the rest of the states, where laws vary and different species are readily available. It is very hard to control which species are being brought into the state.
Because Florida is a much nicer place to be a pacu than upstate New York, it currently has a population of introduced pacus.
Winter keeps the pacus from taking the Hudson, but I think they are lucky that wels catfish aren’t widely available on the pet market in the United States.
This giant predatory catfish could easily colonize North American rivers– and they have been known to attack people!
