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Animal Crossing Fish - Explained #244

Brought to you by a marine biologist continuing with eels...

CLICK HERE FOR THE AC FISH EXPLAINED MASTERPOST!

So, yesterday we covered yet another moray eel, and today, we won't! Of the eels present in the Animal Crossing franchise, moray eels still make up about 44% of them, even when we include today's new eel, the Darkfin Pike Eel.

The Darkfin Pike Eel was available in ACPC throughout the summer of 2023 and hasn't returned. It was uncommon at Saltwater Shores, but being under a long, thin shadow, as other eels are, might have made it easier to sus out.

I find it funny that the English version of the game calls this the Darkfin Pike Eel, which is the common name used in Australia. The more widespread common name is the Daggertooth Pike Conger (Muraenesox cinereus), with "pike congers" being a brand new group of eels AC hasn't included until now! Pike congers are true eels in the Order Anguilliformes. Their Family, Muraenesocidae, is within the Suborder Congroidei, which includes the proper conger eels. This means today's fish is more closely related to our garden eels (the splendid and spotted) than it is to our morays and other eel friends. ACPC did a great job on this sprite - the important details are in the well-developed pectoral fins this species has, the long, pointed face, and the sharp teeth!

From Joel Sartore's (National Geographic photographer and speaker) Photo Ark - https://www.joelsartore.com/product/photo-ark-book/

And it's in the game because - you guessed it - it is a popular food fish in Japan. They actually have a very hefty fishery and are considered a delicacy in some parts of Japan.

The Daggertooth can get pretty damn big, with large specimens growing to 7ft or over 2m. They live throughout the Indo-Pacific, from the Red Sea to IndoChina and Japan. They have well-developed jaws and...their teeth are just crazy. The upper jaw has a single row of teeth down the middle instead of being normal. The end of the lower jaw almost resembles a spike ball, with large dagger-like teeth just springing up from the gums. That's probably where it got its name. I'd also hazard an educated guess that these teeth are amazing at catching and holding onto slippery prey like fish, which they do feed on.

Eels, in general, and for the most part, are naked. That includes the Daggertooth. They don't have scales, and if they do, they are embedded deep in the skin, very much unlike the type of fish scales you would first think of. Lots of fish are naked, which I know from experience doesn't really register to most people. That is, unless you're Kosher, in which case, this can actually turn into a big deal, depending upon how strictly you observe. For the rest of the class, "Kosher" refers to food that adheres to Jewish dietary laws. One of these laws states that to be Kosher, you mustn't eat seafood unless it has scales and fins. This basically rules out all types of crustaceans and mollusks, or really anything that isn't a fish. For some people, as long as it's clearly a fish, it's fine, but others do go further and avoid scale-less fish, like eels. The more you know!

Scales are important to the fish that have them - they provide an extra layer of protection from predators, parasites, and also just simply scratching themselves on something in their environment. For some fish, though, scales aren't worth it. Eels, and lots of other naked fish, cover themselves in very thick coats of slime to protect themselves in the way that scales might. Without scales, they also have behaviors that protect them. They may be great at camouflage, they might burrow into sediment, or they'll hang out in very narrow crevices all day, all as ways to circumvent the fact that they are naked and vulnerable. As we have covered many times on AC Fish Explained, all traits have pros and cons. Losing a trait and thriving anyway (there are just about 1000 species of eels) probably means you're better off without it. (And by "better off" I mean, the animal can now use the energy and resources it would have used to build and maintain scales on some other trait, or becoming more fecund (aka having more babies), or getting bigger, etc etc etc...)

And there you have it! Fascinating stuff, no?

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