Fishy Fish Facts
The teeth of the tiger shark rest on a spring. When the shark's mouth is closed, the teeth are pressed back firmly against the gums. When the mouth is opened the teeth spring out, ready for action.
The White Shark:
- Has teeth that rank on a scale of hardness with steel.
- Is the only creature in the sea with no natural enemies; even killer whales normally avoid it.
- Can survive brain damage better than any animal in the world.
- Never gets sick. It has mysterious antibodies that give it immunity to practically every known bacterial invader. It is also one of the few animals known to be completely immune to cancer.
- Can hear sounds a mile away.
- Is always hungry; no matter how much it eats, its appetite is never satisfied—it lives in a state of continual hunger.
Despite their ferocity and reputation, however, sharks rarely attack man. Three times as many people are killed each year by lightning as are killed by sharks. A hundred more people die from bee stings each year than from shark bites.
Atlantic salmon are able to leap 15 feet high.
Most tropical marine fish could survive in a tank filled with human blood.
An electric eel can produce a shock of more than 600 volts, five times more powerful than a household outlet. It not only uses this power to kill its prey but to locate it as well—through it is born with eyes, it is blind as an adult and employs its electricity to find food in much the same way as man uses radar.
Minnows have teeth in their throat.
The lungfish can live out of water in a state of suspended animation for three years.
A marine catfish can taste with any part of its body. The female marine catfish hatches her eggs in her mouth.
The garfish has green bones.
All freshwater eels, both the European and American species, are born in the same place, a seaweed- and vine-clogged section of the ocean south of Bermuda known as the Sargasso Sea. From this location, the eels migrate to various parts of the world, the American eels to North America, the European eels to Europe. The trips may take as long as three years. Once they arrive at their destination, the males remain at the river mouths while the females move farther upstream, finally settling in small island lakes and ponds. They remain there for ten to fifteen years, until they receive a strange instinctive call back to the sea. Swimming against great river currents, leaping upward like salmon, sometimes leaving the water altogether to crawl along great stretches of land, the female eel finally makes her way back to the sea, where she joins the male. Then they swim together directly to the Sargasso Sea. Here they mate, spawn, and die.
The lantern fish has a glowing spot on the front of its head that acts like a miner's lamp when the fish is swimming in dark waters. This “lamp” is so powerful that it can shed light for a distance as great as 2 feet. Experiments have shown that when confined to an aquarium, the lantern fish can project enough light to allow a person to read a book in an otherwise totally darkened room.