Testicle-Eating Fish Found In New Jersey Lake

A fish known as a testicle-eating fish, or otherwise known as “Pacu” has been found in a New Jersey lake.

The Pacu fish isn’t a native species to American water, but rather the Amazon. New Jersey isn’t the first unusual place the fish has turned up.

According to the Huffington Post, the fish has also appeared in Denmark, France and Illinois.

A large, 10-inch, Pacu has been found about 10 miles outside of New York and was discovered by Tom Boylan, a retired bus driver.

According to The Raw Story, Boylan, 77, said he caught the 10-inch Pacu fish while angling at a lake in Passaic’s Third Ward Veterans Memorial Park.

When he couldn’t identify the fish, Boylan took it to a nearby pet supply store where the manager called them “tank busters.”

They call the fish tank busters because they tend to grow rather large in a short amount of time.

“Most likely, someone had [the 10-inch Pacu] in their fish tank and it grew too big, so they dumped it,” said Pat Egan, manager at Absolutely Fish.

The Pacu is of the piranha family, but that isn’t the reason it has the rather… interesting name of the testicle-eating fish.

The name testicle-eating fish came from reports that two men in New Guinea reportedly died from blood loss after a Pacu chomped on their testicles according to the Huffington Post.

The report goes on to say that Pacu have wide teeth shaped like molars and strong jaw muscles that allow them to crack open tree nuts and other tough aquatic foods.

But as stated before, they aren’t called testicle-eating fish for nothing. They have been known to mistaken male testicles as… well, nuts.

While some may find these testicle-eating fish a little intimidating, for obvious reasons, reports say that New Jersey residents won’t have to worry about the fish becoming an invasive species because they can’t survive the cold winters.

[Image by Omnitarian via Wikimedia Commons]