The European perch (''Perca fluviatilis''), also known as the common perch, redfin perch, big-scaled redfin, English perch, Euro perch, Eurasian perch, Eurasian river perch, Hatch, poor man's rockfish or in

Anglophone The English-speaking world comprises the 88 countries and territories in which English is an official, administrative, or cultural language. In the early 2000s, between one and two billion people spoke English, making it the largest language ...

parts of Europe, simply the perch, is a

predatory Predation is a biological interaction in which one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill ...

freshwater fish native to

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

and

North Asia North Asia or Northern Asia () is the northern region of Asia, which is defined in geography, geographical terms and consists of three federal districts of Russia: Ural Federal District, Ural, Siberian Federal District, Siberian, and the Far E ...

. It is the

type species In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...

of the

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

'' Perca''. The perch is a popular

game fish Game fish, sport fish or quarry refer to popular fish species pursued by recreational fishing, recreational fishers (typically angling, anglers), and can be freshwater fish, freshwater or saltwater fish. Game fish can be fish as food, eaten aft ...

for recreational anglers, and has been widely introduced beyond its native Eurasian habitats into

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

and

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

. Known locally simply as "redfin", they have caused substantial damage to native fish populations in Australia and have been proclaimed a noxious species in

New South Wales New South Wales (commonly abbreviated as NSW) is a States and territories of Australia, state on the Eastern states of Australia, east coast of :Australia. It borders Queensland to the north, Victoria (state), Victoria to the south, and South ...

Taxonomy

The first

scientific description A species description is a formal scientific description of a newly encountered species, typically articulated through a scientific publication. Its purpose is to provide a clear description of a new species of organism and explain how it diffe ...

of the river perch was made by

Peter Artedi Peter Artedi or Petrus Arctaedius (27 February 170528 September 1735) was a Swedish naturalist and collaborator of Carolus Linnaeus. He is sometimes known as the "father of ichthyology" for his pioneering work in classifying the fishes into gro ...

in 1730. He defined the basic morphological signs of this species after studying perch from Swedish lakes. Artedi described its features, counting the fin rays scales and vertebrae of the typical perch. In 1758,

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné,#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. was a Swedish biologist and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming o ...

named it ''Perca fluviatilis''. His description was based on Artedi's research. Because of their similar appearance and ability to cross-breed, the yellow perch (''Perca flavescens'') has sometimes been classified as a

subspecies In Taxonomy (biology), biological classification, subspecies (: subspecies) is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (Morphology (biology), morpholog ...

of the European perch, in which case its trinomial name would be ''Perca fluviatilis flavescens''.

Description

European perch are greenish with red pelvic, anal and caudal fins. They have five to eight dark vertical bars on their sides. When the perch grows larger, a hump grows between its head and dorsal fin. European perch can vary greatly in size between bodies of water. They can live for up to 22 years, and older perch are often much larger than average; the maximum recorded length is . The British record is , but they grow larger in mainland Europe than in Britain. As of May 2016, the official all tackle world record recognised by the International Game Fish Association (IGFA) stands at for a Finnish fish caught September 4, 2010. In January 2010 a perch with a weight of was caught in the river

Meuse The Meuse or Maas is a major European river, rising in France and flowing through Belgium and the Netherlands before draining into the North Sea from the Rhine–Meuse–Scheldt delta. It has a total length of . History From 1301, the upper ...

, Netherlands. Due to the low salinity levels of the

Baltic Sea The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by the countries of Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden, and the North European Plain, North and Central European Plain regions. It is the ...

, especially around the Finnish archipelago and

Bothnian Sea The Bothnian Sea (; ) links the Bothnian Bay (also called the Bay of Bothnia) with the Baltic Sea, Baltic proper. Kvarken is situated between the two. Together, the Bothnian Sea and Bay make up a larger geographical entity, the Gulf of Bothnia, ...

, many freshwater fish live and thrive there. Perch especially are in abundance and grow to a considerable size due to the diet of

Baltic herring Atlantic herring (''Clupea harengus'') is a herring in the family Clupeidae. It is one of the most abundant fish species in the world. Atlantic herrings can be found on both sides of the northern Atlantic Ocean, congregating in large schools. ...

Distribution and habitat

The range of the European perch covers

fresh water Fresh water or freshwater is any naturally occurring liquid or frozen water containing low concentrations of dissolved salt (chemistry), salts and other total dissolved solids. The term excludes seawater and brackish water, but it does include ...

basins all over Europe, excluding the

Iberian Peninsula The Iberian Peninsula ( ), also known as Iberia, is a peninsula in south-western Europe. Mostly separated from the rest of the European landmass by the Pyrenees, it includes the territories of peninsular Spain and Continental Portugal, comprisin ...

. Their range is known to reach the

Kolyma River The Kolyma (, ; ) is a river in northeastern Siberia, whose basin covers parts of the Sakha Republic, Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, and Magadan Oblast of Russia. The Kolyma is frozen to depths of several metres for about 250 days each year, b ...

Siberia Siberia ( ; , ) is an extensive geographical region comprising all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has formed a part of the sovereign territory of Russia and its predecessor states ...

to the east. It is also common in some of the brackish waters of the

. The European perch lives in slow-flowing rivers, deep lakes and ponds. It tends to avoid cold or fast-flowing waters but some specimens penetrate waters of these type, although they do not breed in this habitat. They are most abundant in relatively shallow lakes and lakes with deep light penetration, and less abundant in deep lakes and those with low light penetration.

Introduction outside Europe

European perch has been widely introduced, with reported adverse ecological impact after introduction. In Australia, the species is implicated in the decline of the now-endangered native fish, the Macquarie perch.

Behaviour and reproduction

The European perch is carnivorous, with juveniles feeding on

zooplankton Zooplankton are the heterotrophic component of the planktonic community (the " zoo-" prefix comes from ), having to consume other organisms to thrive. Plankton are aquatic organisms that are unable to swim effectively against currents. Consequent ...

, bottom invertebrate fauna and other perch fry, while adults feed on both invertebrates and fish, mainly

stickleback The sticklebacks are a family of ray-finned fishes, the Gasterosteidae which have a Holarctic distribution in fresh, brackish and marine waters. They were thought to be related to the pipefish and seahorses but are now thought to be more close ...

s, perch, roach and minnows. Perch start eating other fish when they become fingerlings at a size of around . Male perch become sexually mature at between one and two years of age, females between two and four. In the

Northern Hemisphere The Northern Hemisphere is the half of Earth that is north of the equator. For other planets in the Solar System, north is defined by humans as being in the same celestial sphere, celestial hemisphere relative to the invariable plane of the Solar ...

they spawn between February and July. Males reach spawning areas ahead of females, and court mates by chasing through underwater vegetation. During reproduction, the female lays a white ribbon of eggs up to one meter long, which is deposited on water plants or on the branches of trees or shrubs immersed in the water. There has been speculation, but only anecdotal evidence, that eggs stick to the legs of wading birds and are then transferred to other waters. The eggs hatch after a period of 8 to 16 days. The larvae are long on hatching, and live in open water where they feed on

plankton Plankton are the diverse collection of organisms that drift in Hydrosphere, water (or atmosphere, air) but are unable to actively propel themselves against ocean current, currents (or wind). The individual organisms constituting plankton are ca ...

. Juveniles migrate to areas nearer the shore and bottom during their first summer.

Diseases and parasites

'' Cucullanus elegans'' is a species of parasitic nematode. It is an endoparasite of the European perch. Juvenile perch are commonly infected by '' Camallanus lacustris'' (

Nematoda The nematodes ( or ; ; ), roundworms or eelworms constitute the phylum Nematoda. Species in the phylum inhabit a broad range of environments. Most species are free-living, feeding on microorganisms, but many are parasitism, parasitic. Parasitic ...

), '' Proteocephalus percae'', '' Bothriocephalus claviceps'', '' Glanitaenia osculata'', '' Triaenophorus nodulosus'' (all

Cestoda Cestoda is a class of parasitic worms in the flatworm phylum (Platyhelminthes). Most of the species—and the best-known—are those in the subclass Eucestoda; they are ribbon-like worms as adults, commonly known as tapeworms. Their bodies co ...

) and '' Acanthocephalus lucii'' ( Acanthocephala).

Predators

The European perch is a frequent prey of many fish-eating predators such as the Western osprey (''Pandion haliaetus''), great cormorant (''Phalacrocorax carbo'') and

common kingfisher The common kingfisher (''Alcedo atthis''), also known as the Eurasian kingfisher and river kingfisher, is a small kingfisher with seven subspecies recognized within its wide distribution across Eurasia and North Africa. It is resident in much of ...

(''Alcedo atthis''), and it is an important item in the diet of the globally threatened Dalmatian pelican (''Pelecanus crispus''). Other non-avian predators include the

northern pike The northern pike (''Esox lucius'') is a species of carnivorous fish of the genus ''Esox'' (pikes). They are commonly found in brackish water, moderately salty and fresh waters of the Northern Hemisphere (''i.e.'' holarctic in distribution). T ...

(''Esox lucius'') and the

Eurasian otter The Eurasian otter (''Lutra lutra''), also known as the European otter, Eurasian river otter, European river otter, common otter, and Old World otter, is a semiaquatic mammal native to Eurasia and the Maghreb. The most widely distributed member o ...

(''Lutra lutra'').

Relationship with humans

Fishing

European perch is fished for food and as

game A game is a structured type of play usually undertaken for entertainment or fun, and sometimes used as an educational tool. Many games are also considered to be work (such as professional players of spectator sports or video games) or art ...

. Its flesh is described as good eating, with a white, firm, flaky texture and well flavoured. According to

FAO The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations; . (FAO) is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations that leads international efforts to defeat hunger and improve nutrition ...

statistics, 28,920 tonnes were caught in 2013. Largest perch fishing countries were

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

, (15,242 tonnes),

Finland Finland, officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It borders Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south, ...

(7,666 tonnes),

Estonia Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and to the east by Ru ...

(2,144 t),

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

(1,121 t) and

Kazakhstan Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a landlocked country primarily in Central Asia, with a European Kazakhstan, small portion in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the Kazakhstan–Russia border, north and west, China to th ...

(1,103 t). Baits for perch include baitfishes (e.g. minnows,

goldfish The goldfish (''Carassius auratus'') is a freshwater fish in the family Cyprinidae of the order Cypriniformes. It is commonly kept as a pet in indoor aquariums, and is one of the most popular aquarium fish. Goldfish released into the w ...

), weather loaches, pieces of raw

squid A squid (: squid) is a mollusc with an elongated soft body, large eyes, eight cephalopod limb, arms, and two tentacles in the orders Myopsida, Oegopsida, and Bathyteuthida (though many other molluscs within the broader Neocoleoidea are also ...

or pieces of raw fish (

mackerel Mackerel is a common name applied to a number of different species of pelagic fish, mostly from the family Scombridae. They are found in both temperate and tropical seas, mostly living along the coast or offshore in the oceanic environment. ...

, bluey,

jack mackerel Jack mackerels or saurels are marine ray-finned fish in the genus ''Trachurus'' of the family Carangidae. The name of the genus derives from the Greek (language), Greek words ''trachys'' ("rough") and ''oura'' ("tail"). Some species, such as ''T ...

sardine Sardine and pilchard are common names for various species of small, oily forage fish in the herring suborder Clupeoidei. The term "sardine" was first used in English during the early 15th century; a somewhat dubious etymology says it com ...

), or brandling, red, marsh, and lob worms,

maggot A maggot is the larva of a fly (order Diptera); it is applied in particular to the larvae of Brachycera flies, such as houseflies, cheese flies, hoverflies, and blowflies, rather than larvae of the Nematocera, such as mosquitoes and cr ...

shrimp A shrimp (: shrimp (American English, US) or shrimps (British English, UK)) is a crustacean with an elongated body and a primarily Aquatic locomotion, swimming mode of locomotion – typically Decapods belonging to the Caridea or Dendrobranchi ...

('' Caridina'', '' Neocaridina'', '' Palaemon'', '' Macrobrachium'') and peeled

crayfish Crayfish are freshwater crustaceans belonging to the infraorder Astacidea, which also contains lobsters. Taxonomically, they are members of the superfamilies Astacoidea and Parastacoidea. They breathe through feather-like gills. Some spe ...

tails. The tackles needed are fine but strong. Artificial lures are also effective, particularly for medium-sized perch. It is possible to fly fish for perch using artificial flies tied for the purpose. Often, the flies required are "streamers" or bait-fish imitations and use flash, colour and movement to entice a take from the perch.

Perch in culture

The European perch is

's national fish. It is also pictured in emblems of several European towns and municipalities, such as Bad Buchau, Gröningen and Schönberg, Plön. The raw fish item in the game Factorio is a plush toy of the European perch.

References

External links

Redfin Perch – Perca fluviatilis
{{Authority control Perch Fish of the Baltic Sea Freshwater fish of Europe Fish of Asia Fish of Russia National symbols of Finland Fish described in 1758 Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus