'Testicle-Eating' Fish Netted In South Jersey

How does a fish native to South America end up in a manmade lake in Delran? And how does it get a reputation for a fondness for biting into testicles.

The first question popped into the head of Ron Rossi after he found a Pacu in Swedes Lake over the weekend, 6 ABC reports.

Pacu are fish with teeth that most closely resemble a human. They are related to the Piranha, and are mostly found in the lakes and streams of the Amazon. They are omnivores, but have been known to attack humans, and in some instance, bite a man’s testicles.

“They bite because they’re hungry, and testicles fit nicely in their mouth,” Henrick Carl, a fish expert at at the Natural History Museum of Denmark, told The Local, Sweden’s English language newspaper.

After that, Animal Planet made an expedition to Papua New Guinea for its “River Monsters” program.

A Pacu was also caught in Passaic County in 2013, according to nj.com.

In each instance, experts attribute the presence of the Amazonian fish to residents who buy the fish in a local pet store, and it somehow gets out of its fish tank and makes its way into the lake.

They can’t survive in cold water, so NJDEP recommends a humane death for the fish.

Rossi is concerned there may be more fish in the lake, which is used by a lot of people and for a marathon, according to the report.

There are also concerns that they could introduce exotic species and parasites into the environment.

As for the reputation for its fondness for testicles, The Huffington Post reports, thank Jeremy Wade and the internet.

Wade featured the fish on a 2011 episode of his Animal Planet show “River Monsters,” reporting that Amazonian locals told him two men died after they had their testicles bitten off by a fish.

British tabloids picked up the story, HuffPo reports, and it became an Internet sensation.

The attached image was provided by WPVI-TV in Philadelphia