Hello Folks! It's time to go underwater and explore the wonderful world of UK fish. Some are spotty, some have stripes. Some prefer lakes, others prefer streams. Prepare to get your feet wet and get your fins in a flap!Each Monday for 12 weeks I will be posting a little teaser for you. Without looking in books or on the internet (i.e - no cheating), see if you can identify the UK fish On Wednesday, so as long as no-one has guessed it, I will post one clue. On Friday I will post the answer along with some additional information for your interest.MYSTERY FISH QUIZ #4Clue: Confuse me with another and I might see red.
Clue: Rivers offer a calm habitat.
Changing my answer to Roach now after that clue !!!
Pete
Birding is for everyone no matter how good or bad we are at it,enjoy it while you can
Ummmm....
If it's river specific then Dace is more likely as they live in flowing rivers and quite often get confused with roach, from memory they have red eyes also???
Yep, decided, I'm going with Dace?
Higgy
Another short week for me, hence the early posting. Back to normal next week - promise!
Congratulations to all of you who guessed (Common) Roach (Rutilus rutilus). First, a bit about the clues: Confuse me with another and I might see red. Roach are often confused with other fish, such as Rudd and Dace. Rudd are more yellowish in colour and their head is sharper with a mouth more upturned. Dace have colourless eyes and a greenish body. Roach have large red spots in the iris of their eyes, which is above and beside the pupil; therefore making them see ‘red’. Rutilus is Latin for ‘red, golden, auburn’. The second clue: Rivers offer a calm habitat. If you take the first letter of each of these words, it spells out Roach (Rivers offer a calm habitat).
Belonging to the Cyprinidae family, the Common roach is a small fish with red fins and a bluish silvery body and white belly. Roach will readily shoal in fresh and brackish water where there is vegetation. Spawning occurs on sunny days in April and May. A female roach can lay up to 100,000 eggs! Roach prefer to feed in deeper waters and are partial to benthic invertebrates.
A picture of a Roach is found here.
Did you know that: the Roach has 39-48 scales along their lateral line.
Keep an eye out for next week’s fish quiz!
Take care,
Claire