What is the legend about the pike ringed by the German emperor Frederick II Barbarossa, which was accidentally caught 267 years later. According to currently unknown sources, the length of this hulk was 5,7 m, and the weight was 140 kg. In one of the German museums, the skeleton of this huge fish was demonstrated for many years, but later it turned out that it was a skillful fake created by enterprising townspeople to attract tourists.
Another legend tells of a huge pike caught at the end of the 18th century in one of the royal ponds in the Moscow region. They found a golden ring on it with a message from Tsar Boris Fedorovich Godunov. The ancient pike weighed more than 60 kg and reached a length of 2,5 meters.
Also in Soviet times, in the literature one could find reports of a huge pike caught in the Northern Dvina, whose weight exceeded 60 kg.
Unfortunately, all of the above facts do not have any evidence.
How old can a pike live
Based only on data verified by scientists, it is worth noting that the real age of a pike can reach 30-33 years. The mass of predatory fish in this case is about 40 kg, with a length of 180 cm.
On the Internet, you can find information that the maximum age of a pike in the wild does not exceed seven years, with a maximum weight of 16 kg. This information is fundamentally wrong and misleads readers. In the USA, quite serious studies have been carried out regarding the maximum age of the pike. A special progressive technique was developed to reduce the possible error to a minimum. As a result, it was possible to find out that the limiting age of local pikes rarely exceeds 24 years. Swedish ichthyologists managed to prove that among pikes there are quite often specimens over the age of 15 years. Scientists from Finland have found that, as a rule, a pike gains a weight of 7-8 kg by the age of 12-14 years.
Facts about catching giant pikes:
- In 1930, in Russia, the fact of the capture of a giant pike weighing 35 kg was recorded on Lake Ilmen.
- In the state of New York, a huge pike weighing 32 kg was caught on the St. Lawrence River.
- On Lake Ladoga and on the Dnieper, fishermen caught pike weighing 20-25 kg. Moreover, the capture of such a large pike in those places was not considered something unusual.
- In 2013, on one of the lakes of the Tyva Republic, the President of the Russian Federation V.V. Putin caught a pike weighing 21 kg.
And there are many such facts, with the development of information technology, their number is constantly growing.
How to determine the age of a caught pike
There are several scientific ways to determine the age of a pike, but the easiest and fastest way for the average angler is to check the size of the caught specimen with the data from the pike growth table. At the same time, it should be taken into account that, depending on the habitat conditions and the food base of the reservoir, the size of adult individuals can vary significantly.
Download: Pike Growth Chart
Usually, ichthyologists determine the age of a pike by annual rings on the scales. This technique is somewhat similar to determining the age of trees, but in this case it is not so accurate and “works” only for fairly young individuals.
It is possible to determine the pike age with high accuracy only in laboratory conditions, by dissecting its head and examining the ear bone of the fish.