What is the largest pike in the world?

Fishing is an extremely entertaining business. They are fond of not only men, but also many of the fair sex. For most of them today, this hobby is the most real hobby to which they devote and holidays, and weekends, and time off, and holidays.

Inveterate fishermen use professional equipment, read special literature, make trips to distant lakes and stakes, spend there extremely long time. Any such fan necessarily has a personal record, imprinted on the photo with the signature: "My biggest pike", "The most successful catch" or "The most successful fisherman". This trophy is displayed with pleasure and pride to guests.

Given the tendency of fishermen of all ages to exaggerate, to say the least, it can be concluded that not all tales of huge pikes caught in the history of mankind can be believed. For example, there is a legend that the largest pike was caught using a conventional seine in 1497, and its age was 270 years.

Determine the age of the pike was helped by the ring worn by the fish on the orders of King Frederick II, allegedly in 1230. Probably, the pike was caught in those days, and then it was just ringed, and then released to freedom.

It is said that this largest pike was a length of 5 meters 70 centimeters, and its weight reached 140 kg! The same story adds that in its scales there was no natural pigment - it was pure white. There is also a legend that the skeleton of the caught fish was transferred to one of the museums of the German city of Mannheim.

But already according to other sources this skeleton was repeatedly subjected to analysis, and the results showed that it was an ordinary forgery. This is not the biggest pike, because the mock-up has collected five different pikes from the spine.

But modern zoology has scientifically stated that the largest pike in the world today lives in North America, in Canada. It is called masking. This species is very similar to the usual pike.

Compared to other congeners, the pike of the maskingon species is much more enduring, they have larger sizes and longer life expectancy. The coloring of the scales of this species is also similar to that of a typical pike. They can be silvery or brown, gray or green with stripes of a dark shade, decaying into spots.

In 1660, an episode was recorded of a similar specimen by Pierre Radisson, a French researcher. The registered catch was two meters in size and weighing seventy-five kilograms. And although there is no material evidence as a photograph or skeleton until our time, this information can be considered true, as some specimens of these American predators reach a weight of 50 kilograms.

Maskinong is the largest pike. Photos made by modern anglers definitely prove this. Let this copy is not exactly 2 meters, but in fact the episode is not included in the Guinness book. For a fish of this species, the length of 180 centimeters is considered to be the most common thing.

Small squinting maskingons already begin to eat live food, as befits a predator, in the first year of its existence, having a body length of only five centimeters. Due to this, they grow extremely fast. For their lifetime - and this is about thirty years - they gain weight on average 32 kilograms.