Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Save the vampire fish

Scientists are now engaged in a desparate effort to save an ugly and fatty vampire fish. That's right, the endangered lamprey has a rasp-like mouth that it uses to attach to other fish and suck their blood.

Why protect vampire fish? Because lampreys play a crucial role in the life cycle of salmon and other fish, living as little worms on the bottoms of rivers when they're young and providing a rich fatty food supply for salmon.

Lamprey were neglected and even reviled because of their unseemly blood-sucking habits as adults, but now we know better.

Just goes to show, don't discriminate against someone or something just because it's a disgusting blood-sucker. Vampires need love too.

19 comments:

nitin said...

your collection of fishes are g8

Anonymous said...

haha well said. ethnocentrism is one of the great hurdles to saving the environment.

Henry Braun said...

We should protect wild life because this is art of nature. Sea lives are in danger because of pollution. We cast our garbage into the sea which is not fair. We should think about sea lives. That's our duty.

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वर्षा said...

every small creature has imp role in invoirment,ant or elephant, nature needs both of them. nice blog, nice post.

Anonymous said...

Haha! This is so true. A lot of people hesitate to protect certain endangered species because they are weird-looking or don't seem to make any contribution to the ecosystem. But even nasty fish are an important part of the system, and would cause quite a stir if they were extinct.

Jessi said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Jessi said...

i wish i was aware of this sooner! I really enjoy this vampire fish and I hope they make it! I'll be praying for them and their blood sucking ways.

Anonymous said...

Pretty fish minus his tagalong friend.

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Clone.Girl. said...

vampires yay!! It bugs me when people say awwww (insert fuzzy mammal here) is soooo cute. That animal could probably rip their head off in 20 seconds, but I have to pick my battles.

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testando...

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ThaBiGGDoGG said...

That is one ugly fish...

Anonymous said...

Human should protect rare animals and other biologes avoiding them deracinate, which should be our responsiblies and will benefit our enviroment and us.

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Michael Litzner said...

Things may be different in the Pacific Northwest, but in the Great Lakes the lamprey was seen as a parasite feeding on the fish population. I grew up along the Saint Mary's River which connects Lake Superior and Lake Huron.

I understand that everything has an important role in the scheme of life, but the lamprey back home were transplants brought to the area by sea-going freighters. It had gotten to the point where they endangered other species of fish because the number of lamprey was so great.

I don't know much about the situation now, I moved away three years ago, so hopefully research has been done.

Redneck said...

Wait, there is such a thing as a vampire fish? Cool. I think I've heard about lampreys once before, but never in a postive light. More power to ya!

FYI, my favorite fish blog is barely about fish at all, and is written by my friend when she's bored, at http://yourdailyfishmoment.blogspot.com/

M_Kashif said...

Very strange name of fish “Vampire Fish”. This type of fish is very rare now. We have to save this fish for future. I hope you will agree with me.

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nollyposh said...

well there you go... the cycle of life ;-)

Kinney said...

Sea lions and seals used to eat a lot of lamprey. They were even more nutritous and easier to catch than salmon. Now, with bad fishery management for conservation of lamprey freshwater habitat, we have blown it again...sound familiar to the removal of LWD?

PinkAvocado said...

i thought that was an eel attacking a fish! hahaha! wow fish are soo diverse!