TWO Papua New Guinea fishermen have bled to death after having their penises bitten off by pirahna-like river fish. The fish, which zero in on urine streams in the water, have struck terror among villagers along the Sepik River, in northwestern PNG. Authorities believe the killer fish is an introduced member of the South American pacu family and a relative of the piranha. In both of last month's fatalities, the fish demonstrated a trait of the piranha by following a trail of urine in the water, swimming to its source and then biting it off with razor-sharp teeth. Some believe the killer may be a food-source fish introduced from Brazil in 1994 by the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) and the PNG National Fisheries Authority (NFO). However marine biologist and aquaculturist Ian Middleton said he believed they were a different species, introduced from across the PNG-Indonesia border. He denied the fish were the descendants of the pacu species introduced to the Sepik River in 1994 and the Ramu River at Madang in 1997 by the FAO and the NFA as a protein substitute. "The killer fish have the most human-like teeth on the bottom jaw I have ever seen and quite possibly feed on insects," he said. Middleton said the FAO/NFA-introduced pacu grew to 20 kilos and had no teeth. Pacu are mainly vegetarian but will adapt to eat almost anything. Middleton said he believed the killer fish had started biting humans because of a lack of naturally occurring food. "The reason for biting people on their genitals I believe is a result of the fish detecting a chemical change in the water, swimming up the urine trail and biting the genitals." Middleton said this behaviour was well-documented in the Amazon, where other species of the piranha family attack in response to urine or blood. He said people along the Ramu River were now harvesting the introduced pacu and there had been no reports of attacks on humans. "I do not believe that in over five years of research and careful consideration that the FAO and the NFA would be stupid enough to introduce such a hazardous species, nor any relative of the piranha," Middleton said. However the Director of the PNG Office of Environment and Conservation, Dr Wari Iamo, yesterday expressed "grave concern and dissatisfaction" at the way some government agencies and donor organisations had gone about importing exotic plant and animal species. "A classic example is the salvinia molesta (a floating water weed) control program in the Sepik during the 1980s which cost millions of kina (dollars) because someone accidentally introduced the weed into the river system," he said. "In the last two decades various agencies and individuals have introduced over 30 species of exotic fishes into the country." AAP |
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