V: Carp
Why your goldfish might be getting drunk.
Good morning. Today is quintidi, the 25th of Floréal, Year CCXXXI. We celebrate la carpe, a big old freshwater fish that sometimes comes in gold.
💡
There is a big difference between goldfish and koi, and it's not just the whiskers, called barbels (although the presence of that little mustache is the easiest way to know you're looking at a koi). Goldfish and koi are both in the carp family – indeed, koi is just a fancy word for a regular carp who happens to have pretty coloring – but goldfish have been bred by humans to have uniform color and remain at a small size, mostly from the Prussian carp species, and at this point are entirely new species themselves. While a goldfish and a carp can technically breed, the offspring will be sterile. Koi, on the other hand, can breed with any old carp, which is why a fishpond full of brightly colored koi will eventually yield bland looking carp within a few generations. When you're looking at a pretty koi population, you're looking at a carefully selected group of genetic outliers.
Carp evolved to survive freezing freshwater lakes, and are renowned for their ability to "hibernate" through a winter ice-over of anything from a lake to a decorative backyard pond. But how do they do it? A carp obviously isn't a mammal, so it can't just pack on fat and sleep away the ice, right?
The answer is simple: it gets drunk.
