Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!rutgers!unix!garth!phipps
From: phipps@garth.UUCP (Clay Phipps)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Mysterious exploding fish
Message-ID: <509@garth.UUCP>
Date: 26 Jun 90 11:57:58 GMT
References: <1990May18.212647.19155@actrix.co.nz> <28386@eerie.acsu.Buffalo.EDU>
Reply-To: phipps@garth.UUCP (Clay Phipps)
Organization: Intergraph APD, in semiarid Palo Alto, CA
Lines: 43

In article <28386@eerie.acsu.Buffalo.EDU>,
v151luy2@ubvmsa.cc.buffalo.edu writes:
>In article <522@argus.mrcu>, paj@mrcu (Paul Johnson) writes...
>> 
>>>OK skeptics and scientists, please explain this event, which happened
>>>here in New Zealand yesterday:
>>>[a flatfish was alleged to have exploded while being prepared for cooking]
>
>Flounder are a favorite of spear fisherman 
>so perhaps an explosive spear head or the explosive component of same, 
>was lodged w/in the fishes tissues. 
>when the knife hit it ... KERPOW!

No one (that I recall) reported the size of the allegedly exploding fish,
but on the off-chance that the idea above was offered seriously:

An ordinary speargun of moderate size (well shorter than 1 meter/3 feet) 
and spear strength--with a sharp nonexploding point--is adequate 
to take halibut (1 meter/3 feet long, 20 or more pounds), 
which are the largest flatfish that that we have offshore,
hence larger than any flounders around here
(there may be flounder out there larger than the size given above,
but that was simply the approximate size of the largest halibut that 
I have taken while spearfishing--unfortunately, it was not just
the largest, but also the only, halibut I have ever taken).

Using an explosive spear-point to take flatfish strikes me as being
in the same category as using a grenade-launcher to hunt deer.

BTW, I just wanted to point out the silliness in the explanation
offered for a (perhaps no less silly) allegedly exploding fish,
so please save any "noble vegetarians versus killer carnivores" 
follow-ups for the proposed "talk.environment" news-group.
-- 
[The foregoing may or may not represent the position, if any, of my employer, ]
[ who is identified solely to allow the reader to account for personal biases.]
[Besides,this message was written and posted way before normal business hours.]
                                              
Clay Phipps 
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