Team finds football-sized goldfish in Australian lake

An Australian program focused on tracking the migratory patterns of goldfish yielded an unexpected bonus recently when researchers stumbled up a football-sized specimen.

According to a press release from the study team, the discovery has impactions for managing the goldfish population in Western Australia. The researchers are trying to learn about the movements of a released goldfish population in the region’s Vasse River, and the massive specimen revealed to the team that the population has migrated over great distances.

“Our research discovered the fish displayed a significant seasonal shift in habitats during breeding season, with one fish moving over 230 kilometre during the year,” said team member Stephen Beatty, from the Centre of Fish and Fisheries at Murdoch University in Australia.

Goldfish Populations Growing Unchecked

Thus far, the goldfish population has evaded attempts to keep it under control.

“The goldfish population in the nutrient rich Vasse River has existed for over two decades and has the fastest known individual growth rate of this species in the world,” Beatty said. “The results of this study will have important direct management implications, enabling more strategic development of effective control programs for the species such as targeting migratory pathways.”

Goldfish are indigenous to eastern Asia, and are now undoubtedly one of the world’s worst invasive aquatic species. Incidentally, more than 76 invasive freshwater fish species exposed to rivers in Mediterranean climate regions around the planet.

Described as an alien species brought to Australian freshwater bodies, goldfish can get into river systems after being tossed from aquariums into a local body of water. Once a population gets set up, their removal is often difficult. These invasive populations are having a noteworthy influence on Australian environments.

“Once established, self-sustaining populations of alien freshwater fishes often thrive and can spread into new regions, which is having a fundamental ecological impact and are major drivers of the decline of aquatic fauna,” Beatty said.

The program scientists said the invasive fish could possibly impact water quality, bring in disease, disrupt habitat and vie with native species, putting them under severe stress, which just increases the existing threats linked with habitat and lowering water quality.

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Image credit: Murdoch University

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