Red-bellied piranha found in North Park Lake, anglers warned to be careful

Someone apparently took on the job of stocking North Park Lake.

The Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission annually puts trout into the lake. But someone dumped a red-bellied piranha — likely from a fish tank — in there, too.

A woman fishing with her son caught it Tuesday, according to the Allegheny County Parks Department, which received a call and subsequent pictures.

“With the help of the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission, we were able to confirm that it was a red-bellied piranha,” parks Director Andrew Baechle said Wednesday.

Tom Crist, manager of the agency's regional office in Somerset, did not return a call seeking comment. Eric Levis, the agency's Harrisburg-based press secretary, said he was unable to confirm the type of fish.

It's still out there. As the anglers were removing the piranha from the hook, it flopped back into the water.

Such reports of exotic catches are not unheard of here. In recent years, anglers have caught piranhas — and pacu, a related species, but with blunter teeth — in other local waterways, including the Ohio, Allegheny and Monongahela rivers, among others.

It's unlikely those fish survived long, and chances of this one faring any better are poor, said Mark Lautman of Aqua-World Pet Super Center on Ohio River Boulevard in Emsworth.

Piranhas are a tropical fish, he said. They can tolerate water temperatures as low as 68 degrees, but prefer them between 76 and 82.

The onset of a Western Pennsylvania winter will surely kill them, he said.

“No way would they survive,” Lautman said.

Still, park officials are advising people to be careful should they catch it.

“From a human safety point, the greatest chance of an individual getting injured from a piranha would be an angler who catches one and is bitten while attempting to remove a hook from the jaw,” reads a statement from county spokeswoman Amie Downs.

Piranhas are omnivores that eat everything from insects and worms to fish and plants.

“There is no indication that there a large number of piranha in the lake, and this is, in fact, the first such report,” Downs stated.

The fish are actually kind of skittish, Lautman noted. If nothing else, the fish is a reminder that no animals should be released into the park, Baechle said.

“It's not good for the park, the animals or our residents,” he said.

It's illegal to introduce nonnative species into commonwealth waters, Levis said.

“It can be harmful to the fish since it's not their natural environment, and it may present a danger to anglers and others,” he said.

Bob Frye is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at bfrye@tribweb.com or via @bobfryeoutdoors.

Article by Bob Frye,
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