Pupfish

No, I spelled that right and no, a pupfish isn't a baby dogfish, but he is an interesting little fellow. Once again my husband and I were tossing around ideas for this blog and the pupfish popped up, because according to my husband, a pretty smart guy, the pupfish is the only endemic freshwater fish in the Bahamas. That word only tugged at my doubt trigger so I let the research begin.

First a little info on the pupfish, they are tiny and can survive in salty water. Their 50 similar looking species can be found across North, South, and Central America. Most pupfish eat algae and detritus. The pupfish that live in the lakes in the Bahamas however, are an exception and have evolved special jaws to eat the scales of other fish, snails, and clam shrimp. Other fish, so the pupfish is either feasting on other pupfish or perhaps he isn't the only after all! (My husband might accuse me of mincing words like the tiny pupfish minces through tough scaled and shelled critters for dinner.) Pupfish in the Bahamas have been evolving up to 130 times faster than other pupfish and researchers want to know why. (I just want to know if they are the only endemic freshwater fish in the Bahamas.)

So I went to Google and typed in freshwater fish in the Bahamas. And I found a list of 36. Among those listed was one that immediately caught my eye, the fat sleeper, I should’ve figured Google would know I've been sleeping in while Arnie goes to work! They have that tracking app! Then I looked a bit closer and saw the Bull Shark on the list and through further research I found that Bull Sharks do upon occasion travel up freshwater rivers, and I just figured all sharks stayed in the ocean. I next noticed several aquarium fish listed, (sailfin molly, green swordtail, and southern platyfish), which got me looking further at a column labeled STATUS, where I confirmed that the previous 3 aquarium fish were, as I’d already figured, introduced (probably by someone emptying their aquarium). Among the 36 (mostly fish like snapper, sharks, and mullet that I figured would also be listed as salt water fish) there was only one other than the Bahama Pupfish listed as endemic. That honor goes to the Bahama Gambusia, a mangrove swamp minnow. I figured with salt water intrusion, the freshness of the water in the mangrove swamp could be debated.

I finally found the Living National Treasures website (where my husband got his info) and according to that my husband is correct, there is only one endemic freshwater fish in the Bahamas and it is the Bahama Pupfish. The word to mince here is endemic, unless you are a scale biting pupfish, in that case feel free to go mince and munch on any non-native fish you can get your tiny jaws on.