Why you shouldn't go skinny dipping in Denmark....
www.foxnews.com/science/2013/08/12/testicle-biting-fish-may-be-invading-denmark/
Jaws may not be the only one salivating as you splash.
Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water, a cousin of the piranha reported to go after swimmer's testicles has been found in coastal waters between Sweden and Denmark. And fish experts are warning locals to stay aware -- in order to stay whole.
"Keep your swimwear on if you're bathing in the Sound these days -- maybe there are more out there!" Henrik Carl, a fish expert at the Natural History Museum of Denmark, www.thelocal.se/49558/20130809/Keep your swimwear on if you're bathing in the Sound these days ...'
- Henrik Carl, a fish expert at the Natural History Museum of Denmark
"They bite because they're hungry, and testicles sit nicely in their mouth," Carl added.
Yikes!
The creature in question is a red-bellied pacu, and is native to the Amazon. Pictures of the freaky fish frequently make the rounds of inboxes because of its strangely human-looking teeth.
Local fisherman Einar Lindgreen caught the exotic species on Aug. 4 in the Oresund, the strait between Denmark and Sweden, according to LiveScience. The toothy chomper Lindgreen found was just 8 inches long, but the fish can grow to weigh as much as 55 pounds.
Though its teeth are used mainly to crush nuts and fruits, the pacu eats other fish and invertebrates and there have been some reports of human attacks. In Papua New Guinea, the invasive species has reportedly earned a reputation as the "ball-cutter" after castrating a couple of local fishermen, LiveScience said.
"It's the first time this species has been caught in the wild in Scandinavia," fish expert Peter Rask Mller of the University of Copenhagen said in a statement. "Discovering whether this fish is a lone wanderer or a new invasive species will be very exciting. And a bit scary."
"It is not unlikely that someone has emptied their fish tank into a nearby stream just before a vacation and that the pacu then swam out into the brackish waters of Oresund," Mller said.
Better tie those trunks extra tight, however -- just in case.
Read more: https://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/08/12/testicle-biting-fish-may-be-invading-denmark/#ixzz2bnuAXmEE
COPENHAGEN, Denmark, Aug. 16 (UPI) -- A Danish professor who warned Scandinavian swimmers to beware of a testicle-biting fish from South America said he was joking about the creature's diet.Peter Rask Moller, a professor at the Copenhagen Museum of Natural History, warned male swimmers to closely protect their private parts this month after a fisherman in Denmark caught a South American pacu, a toothed relative of the piranha, CNN reported Friday.He said the fish sometimes confuse the male sexual organs for tree nuts."Anyone choosing to bathe in the Oresund these days had best keep their swimsuits well tied," Moller said.However, the professor said his warning was not meant to stir a panic."We did say that we recommend men to keep their swimsuits tied up until we know if there are more pacus out there in our waters," Moller said. "Of course, this is half a joke since it is very unlikely that you would actually meet one here and that it would bite you. It's up to people themselves how careful they want to be. I'll keep my shorts on, though."William Fink, a piranha researcher at the University of Michigan, said the pacus are vegetarians and there have been no reports of the fish attacking humans."The nuts that they're eating, the fruits that they're eating, are splashing down from above, and humans don't act like that when they're swimming," Fisk said.
Read more: https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2013/08/16/Danish-professor-says-testicle-biting-fish-warning-was-a-joke/UPI-86881376676053/#ixzz2dhlr56cr
Oh thank God it's a joke! I saw "invasive species", that it was from the Amazon and had been able to survive cold water in Denmark--which would have meant it could live anywhere. My skinny dipping days would have ended.
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