Pike | Facts & Information

Origin

It can sometimes be found even in alpine lakes, up to an altitude of 1500 m, which demonstrates its great ability to adapt to the most varied conditions.

In Romania, Pike lives in all fresh waters, both flowing and standing. In the waters of the hilly and lowland lakes it can be found everywhere downstream of the mrena area. Most specimens are found in the overflow ponds of the Danube, as well as in the Delta.

It also occurs in fish farms, where its spread in exaggerated numbers is prevented by fish farmers.

Pike can also be found in the regions near the Danube River, where the waters are semi-saline (the so-called "brack" water, meaning fresh water with a low salinity), although these places do not constitute a favorable environment for Pike (Laguna lakes Razelm-Sinoe, Zmeica, Golovita, etc.).

Feeding Pike

It has extremely good eyesight, doubled by the elasticity and appreciable mobility of the body, grabs prey with great skill with the help of its powerful teeth. His teeth serve only to catch prey, not to chew food, so he uses them exclusively to bite. Smaller fish usually catch them by the middle and turn them over then continue to swim so that they can swallow them head first.

Pike is the most gluttonous and most courageous predatory fish in our waters. His lust has no limits. It often happened that a pike swam for hours with a fish in its mouth, swallowed only half, because the food previously consumed had not yet been digested and its last catch simply had no place in its stomach.

In the absence of small fish, the Pike attacks other Pike of the same size, although in this case the catch can be fatal because it can drown. Its cannibalism also knows no bounds: it devours its own offspring, and even during reproduction the larger females often eat the smaller males that, shortly before, were their partners in the act of reproduction.

It attacks anything that comes in its path and seems edible, whether it's a mouse or a rat that fell into the water, a snake or a frog, small birds or insects that fell into the water. There have been reported cases when Flemish Pikes snouted the cows taken to adapt.

In connection with the Pike's appetite, it should be mentioned that even in winter it does not decrease its appetite, although it is more difficult to lose its hunger due to insufficient food during this period. During these months, the Pike leads a more mobile life, does not sit on the prowl, but goes hunting.

In some fish farms in the West, in large carp pools, are often intentionally introduced a few pike specimens, which exercise in the pool the role of" fish-cop", that is, eat all the smaller specimens of some worthless species that have spread in the pond and that compete carp, consuming the food that is intended for it.

The Pike is also called the sanitary fish of freshwater and especially of carp farms, because it devours all the sick or dead specimens in that basin. Pike is an extremely hardy fish. It does not die even in the most harsh conditions, and if it lacks food, at most it develops more slowly.

The meat of the Pike is quite tasty, although it has many bones. And its eggs are especially tasty.

Features Pike

The body of the Pike is elongated, slightly flattened laterally, the head also long, slightly curved from the profile. The muzzle resembles a duck's beak. The Pike has a wide mouth, with jaws that open to below the eyes, so that it can swallow a fish almost the same size. The teeth are well developed, strong and sharp.

The lower jaw is longer than the upper one. Another feature is the dorsal fin, located far from the head, near the tail, at the same level as the fin below the tail. The line of the back is slightly bulging, while the ventral line is right. The eyes are set high, in the forehead region.

The color of the Pike serves to "camouflage", being harmonized with the colors prevailing in the environment in which the respective specimen lives. The back can range from greenish-gray to greenish-yellow, almost black sometimes or dark tan. The sides are marbled with brown, olive or blackish spots.

The belly is sometimes yellowish, sometimes whitish, also sprinkled with smaller or larger spots. The entire body has a reddish or lilac glow, as do the flippers, which are vargate with gray stripes arranged transversely, on several rows.

Sometimes the head and sides of the body are so often stained that you can no longer notice the basic color. It is noticed that the pike can hide very well in places with reeds or other submerged aquatic plants.

Being a ferocious Raptor, very greedy, the Pike is a fish that grows very quickly. As a rule, at the age of one year it already reaches 25-30 cm and Weight 250 g. its average length (in fresh waters of our country) is 40-50 cm, and the average weight ranges from 1 to 1.8 kg. Pike can also reach a length of 1.5-1.8 m, in this case it exceeds the weight of 20-22 kg.

Of course, these specimens are very rare. The life space of the Pike is constituted by slow flowing fresh waters or backwaters, whose banks are covered by reeds, rushes, etc.as a rule, they prefer clean water and avoid swampy portions. It does not stay in the depths of the waters, being always found "between the waters", in the places where small fish move, which provide basic food.

Among or near the grass or reeds in the lake or among the bulrush stems, thanks to its specific color, it merges with that environment, where it stands on the prowl, almost unseen.

Pike Breeding

After mihalt, the Pike is the fish that reproduces at the earliest. As a rule, at the end of February the Pike begin breeding, gathering in groups under the not yet melted ice layer.

The breeding period can be extended until the end of March, and in the case of particularly frosty winters, even until the beginning of April.

As a rule, males reach sexual maturity in the third year of life, females at 3-4 years. Depending on the size, a female lays 100,000-350,000 grains of Roe, but especially large specimens have in their ovaries even quantities exceeding half a million eggs, which they deposit in a single serving. The eggs are yellowish in color and have a diameter of 2.5-3 mm.