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Posted by Douglas DuHamel Jul 19, 2008 |
Sports fishermen and biologist Zeb Hogan captured a 14-foot long giant freshwater stingray in the Bang Pakong River in Thailand. Thank goodness he didn’t kill it because he is doing research. This could easily be the largest freshwater fish in the world.
After weeks of searching remote rivers for giant fresh water stingrays, Hogan managed to catch one near a Thai city. To his surprise, the giant gave birth shortly after being caught. This was another unexpected event.
There are accounts of these fish weighing in at over 1,000 pounds and that makes them the world’s largest fish, said Hogan. Hogan runs the National Geographic Society’s Megafish Project, and is in the process of documenting 20 or more of these freshwater giants.
The giant river rays are very difficult to catch because they bury themselves in mud when hooked. They routinely break fishermen’s lines and bend finger sized hooks straight in order to avoid capture. The ray’s deadly barb is located at the base of the whip tail and it can easily penetrate skin and bone with no problems.
It must have been difficult for the research team to capture the stingray because they were dealing with a heavy fish and its weapon. Hopefully the mother stingray and baby were safely returned to the wild after all the research was finished.