“At that moment, the fish emerged, exploding the ocean surface, and fell heavily back into the sea. Then she jumped again and again, and the boat rushed forward, although the scaffolding continued to rush overboard, and the old man pulled it to capacity, released it for a moment, and then pulled it again with all his might, risking that it would break off "(Ernest Hemingway" The Old Man and sea").
The fisherman is lucky
The beautiful fish, who fell for the tackle of Hemingway's hero old man Santiago, but did not bring him happiness, turned out to be a giant marlin from the sailing squad. The writer was an avid fisherman all his life, and therefore could give such a realistic description of the confrontation between man and marlin. A huge fish dragged the unlucky fisherman far from the shore. But in some ways the old man was lucky. If he comes across a sailfish (also from the genus of sailing, but with a greater, so to speak, speed potential than marlin), the old fisherman is unlikely to ever see his home. Why? - very simple. Marlin (the one that got hooked by Santiago) develops a speed of up to 80 kilometers per hour. This is certainly impressive. But a sailfish fish is capable of accelerating to 110 kilometers per hour, and there is officially confirmed evidence of this,seriously differing from the stories of experienced fishermen, if only in that they (the stories), frankly speaking, cannot be trusted for a penny.
Hemingway fishing.
In our northern, and even southern seas, representatives of sailing ships are practically not found - these fish usually live only in those waters where it is warm all year round. Although it is true very rarely, some of them, perhaps by accident, make a visit to the Black Sea. Sailboats keep not very far from the surface, but sometimes, carried away by the pursuit of prey, they can dive deep enough. On the back of the representatives of this species there is a large fin resembling a Latin oblique sail. Actually, for this decoration, the fish were called sailboats.
Safe predator
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All sailboats are predators, and this is evidenced by a powerful, long body covered with scales sunken in the skin and an aggressive jaw, decorated with a rather long, spear-like growth. True, this build-up is not a weapon, its main role is to cut the water, to reduce the turbulent flows that arise around the body of the fish when it pursues its prey. It is thanks to this build-up and the special structure of the body that sailboats are capable of developing a breakneck speed in the water, which is quite sufficient to catch up with almost any prey.
Sailfish fish.
People need not be afraid of meeting a sailing ship. Despite its formidable appearance and impressive size, the jaws of these fish are rather poorly developed. Their main prey: tuna, squid and some other types of fish and marine animals.
Underwater dancing
All sailboats differ from other genera by the high and long main dorsal fin, which has the shape of a sail, with the largest rays in the middle part. The back of these fish is colored dark blue, and the sides and belly have a silvery sheen. Numerous black specks are scattered on the bright blue dorsal fin.
Sailboat dancing.
The dorsal fin, during calm swimming, is retracted into a special niche in the back of the fish and is almost invisible. The fin unfolds in full growth only when the fish uses it as a stabilizer during sharp turns, for example, during the pursuit of prey. Interestingly, at the moment of the attack, the sailboat changes its color, begins to shimmer in all shades from silver to black. Why he does this is unclear. Perhaps the predator is thus trying to confuse its prey, confuse it in order to catch it without interference and unnecessary chase. It is interesting that, unlike the same marlin, the sailfish is capable of very abruptly and unpredictably changing the direction of movement and, if necessary, instantly freeze in place. We can say that the sailboat is the most graceful fish in terms of movement, an underwater "ballerina".
Once upon a time, more than half a century ago, off the coast of Peru there were unusually large specimens of sailing ships - giants weighing more than 700 kilograms. Now such records are in the past. Despite the fact that sailboats reproduce quite actively, they are caught much faster, and therefore now this species is considered rare and even disappearing.
Speed records
The sailboat unbreakably holds the speed record among fish. He is followed by his closest relative, the marlin. But both of them are far from the only "racers" in the oceans. Not much behind marlin is the waho fish, which lives in the waters surrounding Central America. Her speed record is 78 kilometers per hour.
Marlin.
The common tuna with its 70 kilometers per hour is somewhat behind the vakho. Perhaps, if tunas could move a little faster, they would not become the favorite food of killer whales and other predators. But what to do? Killer whales also need to feed on someone, and if they do not catch up with the marlins, then let it be tuna.
But the next sea sprinter does not have to run away from anyone. Rather, all other inhabitants of the World Ocean strive to make way for it as soon as possible. This is a great blue shark, whose top speed is just one kilometer behind tuna. (This is how sometimes such a small figure decides who will live and who will die). The blue shark is in a hurry only when it wants to eat, and here it is better not to come across not only fish, but also people on its way. This animal does not understand how many limbs its prey has and what species it (prey) belongs to, but grabs and swallows everyone.
Swordfish can swim a little more slowly, but also with impressive speed - up to 64 kilometers per hour. And very little are the flying fish, whose speed record is 56 kilometers per hour. The advantage of a flying fish is that if it suddenly fails to break away from its pursuer in the water, it jumps to the surface and flies through the air. Usually, the predator, having lost sight of the flying fish at this moment, begins to look for other prey. And the fish, having flown from 50 to 400 meters (if you are lucky with the air currents), flops back into the water alive and healthy, provided, of course, that seagulls or other equally voracious birds did not have time to eat it during the flight.
Konstantin Fedorov