Word: lamprey
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...little rivers that feed the Great Lakes, an evil invader was swarming last week by the slithering thousands: the sea lamprey. It looks like a mottled, bluish eel, but instead of a proper mouth it has a round sucker, like the rubber gadget that plumbers use to unplug drains. Inside the rim are rows of small teeth. When a hungry lamprey spies a fish, it darts to the fish's side. The sucker's teeth dig in and get a firm grip. Then the lamprey worries a hole in the fish with a file-like tongue and sucks...
Originally a saltwater hunter, the lamprey long since learned to like fresh water, and established itself in Lake Ontario. In 1921 it appeared in Lake Erie, presumably detouring Niagara Falls via the Welland Canal. Step by step it pioneered the Lakes, reaching Lake St. Clair in 1930 and Lake Michigan in 1936. This year, the first lamprey was caught on the U.S. side of Lake Superior...
...Rapids. As lampreys multiply, other fish grow proportionately scarce. First victims are the lake trout, whose small, thin scales cannot resist the lamprey's kiss. In Lake Huron, where lampreys do the most damage, the trout catch last year fell to 41,000 Ibs. (It was 1,750,000 Ibs. in 1939.) Many trout caught showed lamprey scars. When trout get scarce, the lampreys go after rough-scaled perch or even armored sturgeon...
Best anti-lamprey measure would be to drum up commercial demand. Lampreys were once a popular delicacy: Henry I of England is reputed to have died from a surfeit of them. Dr. Van Oosten is checking a rumor that Italians in Bessemer, Pa. are lamprey enthusiasts. If a market can be found, enterprising Great Lakes fishermen will gladly exterminate the lampreys free of charge...
...greatest problem for many animals is to encounter and recognize a possible mate. A male lamprey eel apparently recognizes sex only by attaching himself with his suctorial mouth to another eel that clings to a rock. If the second eel lets go, it is a male and the two separate. If the second eel holds onto the rock, it is a female...