Bowfin
Amia calva
— Where the name comes from
Amía was in Aristotle the name of an unidentified fish, taken up by Linnaeus for this North American animal which has nothing to do with the Greek one; calva means “bald”, because the head has no scales. It is the only living representative of an order that in the Jurassic held dozens of species.
— Facts
- Group
- Fish · Actinopterygii · Chondrichthyes
- Order
- Bowfins
- Habitat
- Still weedy water, swamps, oxbows, shallow lakes
- Range
- Eastern North America
- Size
- 45–75 cm, up to 109 cm; 2–4 kg
- Diet
- Fish, crayfish, frogs, insects
- Lifespan
- 30 years
— Characteristics
- 01
It breathes air with a vascularised swim bladder and survives foul water.
- 02
The male builds a circular nest and guards the fry for weeks.
- 03
It has a long undulating dorsal fin that lets it swim backwards.
— What sets it apart
It is the last of a dynasty. The amiiforms appeared a hundred and fifty million years ago and occupied fresh waters over half the world — fossils turn up in Europe, Asia and Africa — and today one species remains, in a corner of North America. It is the kind of survivor evolutionists call a relict taxon, and it is a reminder that great groups never go extinct all at once: first they shrink to one, and that one can last a long time.
