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Dlaware River Snakeheads
- Thread starter Pete
- Start date
Rusty Spinner
Active member
Why is this news? Anglers and bowfishermen have been catching/shooting them in the D for well over a decade. That said, since there is no photo, the guide may have seen a native bowfin which look similar if you don't know what to look for. And they are commonly mistaken for snakeheads. But snakeheads are in the D to stay, just like flathead catfish and other introduced species.
Rusty Spinner
Active member
There is a simple answer to preventing even further spread of snakeheads, and that is to outlaw them as live fish in fish markets. They can be sold dead, but not live. There are some cultures that eat snakeheads and release a live one to replace the one they ate, not understanding the havoc they wreak on our environment where snakeheads don't belong. They started, as best the NJ Division of F&W knows, in tribs of the lower Delaware and that fish has moved upstream steadily ever since. The flatheads, on the other hand, may likely have been a mistake stocking by PA Boat & Fish Commission when flatheads got mixed with channel cats.
Trout Nazi
And...Boom goes the dynamite.
Snakeheads come from the same place as all 3 Bubonic plagues and every influenza pandemic ever. One story is that an enterprising entrepreneur stocked them into his local pond in Florida so that he would have a never ending supply to overprice and sell in his store. I guess we know how the rest of the story goes.
Rusty Spinner
Active member
They are openly sold in some states here in the US as live fish. That is what needs to end. It is a cultural issue as well, because people that buy them for the table will often buy a live one and stock it locally not realizing they are wreaking havoc on local ecosystems.
