Drain the lake to catch the “water monster”

Since mid-July, a resident in Nhuzhou city in central China’s Henan province has noticed the strange creature. It is known in the local media as a “sea monster” with razor-sharp teeth that can grow up to 3m long.

The creature became the focus of an intense hunt that lasted for months. It was located in Yunchan Lake, an artificial lake in the central park of Nhuzhou City.

Hunting “water monster” is challenging because it is not easy to locate in a large lake, surrounded by aquatic plants near the bottom. Previously, measures such as using fishing nets and using sonar devices were unsuccessful. During the intense search for the creature, it attracted millions of followers.

The climax was when the local authorities decided to drain all the water in the lake to “catch up” with it. At the end of last week, workers in Nhuzhou city drained the lake more than 200,000m3 of water to track down. As a result, they caught a pair of rocket crocodiles including a 70cm long male and a 90cm long female.

However, the cost to drain more than 200,000m3 of water is very high, causing a lot of controversy in this country’s public opinion. Many people question the value of emptying the lake just to find the fish.

Now, several other regions in China, including the capital Beijing, have reported the existence of this little-known fish. Many people expressed concern about their encroachment affecting the local ecosystem.

In Kunming, the capital of southwestern Yunnan province, on August 27, workers drained a pond in a residential community in search of another rocket crocodile. Central broadcaster CCTV reported that although the animal was captured, the smaller fishes and groups of crustaceans living in the pond also disappeared.

Jingjiang Daily reported on August 18 that a boy in Jiangsu province was bitten on the hand by another rocket crocodile. Creature that lives in a pond in a residential area. Meanwhile in Beijing, residents reported encountering a similar creature about 50cm long.

Several other locations also reported sightings of rocket crocodiles, including Hunan, Guangxi, Ningxia, Qinghai and Shandong.

Potential dangers

Experts say that the increasing appearance of non-native species is mainly due to people buying them for ornamental purposes and then releasing them into the natural environment.

“The most common invasive animals we found released into the environment include rocket crocodiles,” said Li, an expert who heads a city-based wildlife protection organization. Beijing, shared with Beijing Daily.

This fish can be purchased for as little as a few dozen yuan on several online shopping sites, including major marketplaces such as 1688. Mr. Gu Dangen, an expert on aquatic ecology, comes in. from the Chau Giang River Fisheries Research Institute, said, if this species is released into rivers and lakes in the wild, they can eat everything and become a big threat to the local ecosystem.

One of the largest freshwater fish commonly found in the southern United States and Mexico, the torpedo-shaped rocket crocodile known as a “living fossil” can last for more than 100 million years. before.

Although reports of attacks on humans are rare, they pose a passive threat as the eggs of this species are highly toxic if accidentally ingested. Chinese officials have listed rocket crocodiles in a group of 10 invasive creatures that threaten the country’s ecosystem.