Amur pike stands out among all the variety of fish in the Far East both in size and color. Limited habitat adds excitement to fishermen. To get an unusual specimen you need to overcome a considerable distance. The adrenaline rush when catching a meter fish does not compare with anything. Such sensations cannot be forgotten.
Description
The Amur pike, a photo of which you can see in the text, got its name by its habitat. According to the classification, this is a class of ray-feathers, the pike family. This is a predatory fish - its young growth switches to animal food very early on. Her description looks like this:
- body - slightly compressed laterally, elongated;
- the head is large;
- the snout is elongated, with the lower jaw protruding noticeably;
- the mouth is large;
- the dorsal fin is equipped with 6-7th spiny non-branched rays, the anal fin has 12-14 soft and 4-5 spiny rays, and the caudal is notched;
- teeth - are inclined inside the pharynx; in case of loss of one of them, a new one grows in its place;
The life expectancy of this pike is about 14 years, its live weight reaches 20 kg, and its size is 115 cm.
The body of the fish is covered with small cylindrical scales. Her color is curious. Amur pike, depending on the habitat and age, has various shades of the color of scales and a pattern on the body. It can be golden, silver, greenish. It is darker on the back, scatter throughout the body - distinct dark spots, brown and black, they are also on the dorsal and caudal fins. They are regular oblique transverse rows, each with 25-35 spots.
Young animals (up to 35 cm) have narrow stripes instead of spots. This is a disguise for shallow water, where there is a lot of vegetation. Until the pike are five centimeters long, they feed on zooplankton. Then they begin to hunt small fish. The adult diet includes almost all the fish stock of the water area: chebak, gudgeon, cyprinids, smelt, podust and others. As a lunch, a frog and a small rodent are suitable.
Breeding
The fish reaches puberty by 3-4 years, at this point its length is about 40 cm. The spawning time depends on the time of flooding of ground vegetation. The floods on the Amur River have three peaks - spring, summer and autumn. Spring refers to a more constant in time, but in some years it can significantly shift in time.
Spawning begins immediately after the rivers are freed from ice - from the beginning of April and, sometimes, until mid-June (depending on the temperature of the water), since the high temperature during spawning provokes the death of eggs. Amur or leopard pike lays between 25,000 and 150,000 eggs. The average is 45,000. The eggs are quite large - up to 3.5 mm in diameter, yellowish. Gluten reliably attaches eggs to dense vegetation in the coastal zone.
After 10-12 days, larvae appear, up to 8 mm long, with a yolk sac. The development of the squint is very fast:
- by June - 5 cm;
- in July - up to 14 cm;
- by year - up to 25 cm;
- by three years - up to 45 cm.
This species of pike belongs to the main commercial fish of the Amur basin.
Features and habitat
Amur pike has some distinctive features compared to ordinary:
- she has a lighter tone in the color of the scales;
- young growth in color resembles an ordinary pike, with age, the pattern changes;
- more cylindrical and smooth body;
- head to snout covered with scales;
- smaller scales;
- the close location of the dorsal, caudal and anal fins allows you to carry out lightning attacks from an ambush and jump high out of the water;
- young live in the coastal zone, and when puberty is reached, they go to open areas of rivers and lakes;
- females in the first years of life are much larger than males;
- it does not grow to such a size as an ordinary pike (it can reach 2 m in length).
This fish prefers fresh water with a leisurely course. The main habitat is the Amur basin, the Uda, Sungari, Ussuri, Tungari rivers and their tributaries, lakes Khanka, Kenon, Buir-Nur. Amur pike is found on Sakhalin in the Tym and Poronay rivers.