Mt Isa Fish!

Look at that: thanks to Cyclone Yasi, it's raining in Mt Isa.  So exciting, isn't it!

And if you don't think so too, that's because you don't know about Mt Isa fish. Since these critters are the strangest thing I have EVER come across, I'll tell you about them so you can be excited too.

Mt Isa, a town in the middle of the Australian Outback desert, was once - many millennium ago - in the middle of a great inland sea, and it's a testament to the fact that sea dried very slowly that the fish made the strangest adaption that has ever boggled my mind. 

You won't believe it but I'll tell you anyway: whenever it rains, which is usually only a couple of times a decade, within an hour every puddle has about a dozen of these little silver fingerlings and you think "Those are fish!! How on earth did they get in there?"  But the bizareness has barely started because, over the next five days, these puddles dry up but the fish are still there and you can actually watch as they grow into these monstrous creatures, some nearly as long as my forearm ...

... and if that's not too completely off-the-planet bizarre, the very minute they reach full size, the mad frantic rutting starts and it goes on and on and on for many hours. And this isn't in water because the water has long since dried away; this is right in the rust red dust.

Yup, right across the red dust desert, as far as the eye can see, there's a scrambling orgy of fish sex ... all flashing silver ... and then after mating there's an ocean of writhing flashing silver death throes ... and then you're stuck for days and days of everything reeking with the most brutal dead fish stench.

OK, I'm making it sound more dramatic than it actually is, but nonetheless, it is wondrous strange, I'm telling you, but all around you locals go "What are you fussing about?  Isn't this what fish usually do?" 

Ummm, NO!!!!

And if you're wondering about whether these fish make good eating, everyone laughs at the suggestion.  They are transparent, not unlike jellyfish, and it's obvious they don't have the time to make edible flesh so, despite their tempting size and the fact they're right there for the grabbing, there is no point thinking about them sizzling away in the frying pan.

So that's what happens with Mt Isa fish.  Amazing, huh!!!  It only happens very very rarely ...

 ... but it'll be happening right now.  

Can you visualise it?  If you can't, I'm counting on someone putting this up on youtube so you can see it with your own eyes. Even though it's days away, let me see if there's anything up there yet:

Nope, not really, just this:



Don't bother to watch it unless you have a high tolerance for teenage stupidity!  It's two very silly teenage boys - Jair Garret and William Wright - while babysitting little sister Crystal, reporting on Cyclone Yasi in Mt Isa!  Actually, they're rather charming in a "wouldn't-wish-them-on-my-worst-enemy's-classroom" sort of way.

And they clearly aren't all that bright because they haven't realised that what is beginning to happen all around them is something something truly newsworthy! I just want to shout at them "Start recording those fish, boys, start recording those fish!"

Anyway, I'll keep an eye out and if I find anyone HAS recorded those fish, I'll put it up here for you.

But I tell you, it's so amazing you HAVE to try to see it for yourself for real and with your own eyes one day!