Andrew is a post-doctoral researcher in North Carolina focused on population and conservation genetics in hydrothermal vent communities.
More people have joined in on the Ocean of Pseudoscience week.
First, Shark Diver from Underwater Thrills throws down with Shark Pseudoscience – Juicing Tweaked Bulls. Something tells me Bull Shark Testosterone isn’t going to make you cool, but let’s see if our readers can come up with an explanation why.
Sheril, from the intersection posts on twitter:
Hey #oceans tweeps, real or fake? http://tinyurl.com/28xuztn
The link leads to this picture of an apparently giant freshwater carp that look suspiciously like a goldfish. Well, what do you think, real or fake?
And Zen Faulkes of Neurodojo posts on Eating your own brain. Delicious.
~Southern Fried Scientist
Looks fake to me!
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While I think the first reaction is there is no way it could get that big, I think koi in ponds can easily attain the length shown, and reports have koi reaching up to 90lbs. So I think it is possible that particular type of fish can attain that size with enough food, and I imagine there is plenty of food in a lake for one of those fish.
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Bullshiat, I say.
No way that scrawny guy is holding a fish that size, casually, and in that posture.
/ And the pixels
// And seeing a lot if shops in my day
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Koi are just a variety of domestic carp (Cyprinus carpio)so I think that this is well within the possible size range as another commenter has pointed out. This is obviously not a goldfish (too long a dorsal fin, has a leading dorsal spine, and has barbells) so it looks like a carp to me. The angler’s left fingers do appear to be too large but this could be due to the use of a wide angled lens – a common trick used by anglers to make fish look bigger. I thought that the fish should have been sagging more around the hands but after comparing it to other photos of similar or larger carp being held in the same way it looks OK to me. Another possibility is that it is a wildtype carp that was photoshopped to look orange. Barring that however, I think that the photo is legit with the caveat that the perspective and lens are set up to make it look larger than it would appear in real life.
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I think you may be right.
There are really two questions here. 1. Is a carp of this size possible and 2. is this photo altered to make the fish look bigger?
In general, we seem to agree that that size is possible but the photo is fishy. I think we’ve got a forced perspective here (i.e. the guy is holding the fish out at arms length, so is actually several feet behind the fish) and a little photoshopping.
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