The Register® — Biting the hand that feeds IT

Feeds

Beer-drinking ladyboy fish can live out of water

Jungle boffin in metaphor mass-murder shocker

SaaS data loss: The problem you didn’t know you had

Scientists deep in the jungles of Central America have discovered a type of fish which can live happily for months out of water, in a development with enormous consequences for the English language.

Reuters reports that groups of Rivulus marmoratus, "a type of small tropical killifish" can live for long periods without water inside mangrove logs. It seems that the three- to five-inch-long paradoxical piscines are often found in other non-traditional fish habitats such as "coconut shells or even old beer cans".

Scott Taylor of the Brevard County Environmentally Endangered Lands Program in central Florida spoke to Reuters from his camp in the mangrove swamps of Belize.

"We kicked over a log and the fish just came tumbling out," he said, suggesting that in fact finding a fish out of water was as easy as falling off a log.

Taylor apparently said that the fish can survive for up to 66 days out of water without eating (perhaps by drinking beer).

The fish are notable for other characteristics besides their metaphor-busting habitat preferences. They are also hermaphroditic, according to Reuters:

"They have both testes and ovaries and essentially clone themselves by laying their own, already fertilized eggs."

One might say that they need a man like a fish out of water needs a bicycle. ®

Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Backup/Recovery

Latest Comments

@ LadyBoy <> Hermaphrodite

<bitchslap>

Have at you, you braggard!

</bitchslap>

As per Rule 2....

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/10/19/reg_club_rules/

0
0

Something for the weekend?

"You're like a fish out of water hanging around here. Here's a beer, now go and f**k yourself!

0
0

...or even...

A fish needs a man.like a man needs a bicycle?

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/11/15/bike_bloke_sentenced/

0
0

More from The Register

 breaking news
You've seen the Large Hadron Collider. Now comes the HUGE Hadron Collider
International Linear Collider ready to rock and roll
Headbangers have a gas, gas, gas in mosh pits
Boffins say heavy metal crowds behave like The Vapours
Hubble spies unlikely planet being born in hostile neighborhood
Hoovering a cloud of sand 7.5 billion miles from a tiny star
 breaking news
Jaguar to open new car-making factory in Blighty (virtually)
Britain still makes stuff, it's just not real any more...
 breaking news
China's second woman 'naut blasts off for coupling in HEAVEN
Wang and pals test the cosmic waters for Chinese space station
Scientists investigate 'dark lightning' threat to aircraft passengers
One stormy flight could give lifetime radiation dose
 breaking news
Chinese 'nauts prep for next coupling in Heaven, clear way for new station
Second woman taikonaut and pals test tech for China's own orbiting platform
Boffins hide cute kitty behind invisibility shield
No polarisation or microwaves needed, yet the cat and fish disappear
 breaking news