Rob Aguilar would know: A biologist with SERC’s Fish and Invertebrate Lab, he’s spent the last few years dissecting blue catfish stomachs and analyzing their insides. ![]() The only way to do that is to look into their stomachs, where the majority of their prey has been reduced to almost-unrecognizable slop. However, to discover how much they could disrupt the ecosystem, marine biologists need to know exactly what they eat. They quickly developed a reputation as voracious predators, threatening to devour many popular fisheries and edge out the Chesapeake’s native white catfish. ![]() Blue catfish arrived in Chesapeake Bay in the 1960s, brought by Virginia managers to establish a fishery. The study, published in the journal Environmental Biology of Fishes, used DNA barcoding to get to the gut of what blue catfish prey on. They’re also known to gorge themselves on larvae of channel catfish-and, occasionally, juveniles of their own kind. ![]() White perch, menhaden and darters: These are just a few favorite foods of Maryland’s invasive blue catfish, according to a new study from the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC). Blue catfish SERC biologists dubbed “Megalodon,” which they tracked moving almost 60 miles along the Patuxent River.
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