As the saying goes: four feet are not as good as two feet, two feet are not as good as no feet, that is to say, eating pigs, cattle, mutton is not as good as eating chicken, duck, goose meat, eating chicken, duck, goose meat is not as good as eating fish meat. Most fish are high-quality proteins with a relatively high fat content and are very good meat foods.
There is such a fish, its flesh is tender, fat, scaleless, less thorny, appetizing, easy to digest, the price is cheap, but it is because of the special growth environment, it is crazy spit by everyone, carrying a variety of "infamy" in one.
This fish is a catfish, with a flat head and a wide mouth, two whiskers hanging from its mouth, a slimy body, and a somewhat frightening appearance. Folk have spread the saying "catfish stew eggplant, support the old man" and other sayings. Nowadays, it has changed from a regular customer at the dinner table to a "garbage fish" and "the dirtiest fish in the world", and in some places, it has dropped to 5 yuan per kilogram and few people buy it.
Catfish is too dirty to eat?
In fact, everyone's misunderstanding of catfish often comes from the following reasons:
Reason one: eating feces
Catfish are carnivores and can eat carrion and even feces. Therefore, the carrion and feces of many animals in nature can be the food of catfish. Although they have the ability to eat excrement, it does not mean that they like to eat, and if the water is too polluted, catfish are also prone to illness or even death.
In fact, animal feces itself is a non-toxic and inexpensive natural fertilizer, and manure provides a large amount of nutrients for plankton in the water.
Nature is naturally selective and survival of the fittest, and because catfish is an omnivore that eats everything, its vitality is very tenacious, including its survival in sewage (full of garbage, fecal sewage).
Reason two: eating carrion
Catfish's vision is relatively poor, the eyes are very small, the sense of smell and touch is developed, its tentacles play an auxiliary role in its prey on other fish, the amount of food is very large, all kinds of small fish and shrimp and scavenger are their food.
Scavenging is one reason why catfish are dirty, but in fact, whether it is carnivorous fish, herbivorous fish or omnivorous fish, they will rot.
This is the nature of fish, there is not much food for fish in natural waters, what to eat, not picky eaters to live better.
Reason three: the growing environment
Many people see the above that when catfish eat carrion and feces, they already feel that catfish are dirty. Coupled with the growing environment of sewage, everyone will only think that it is dirtier!
In fact, catfish has low requirements for the growing environment because it can breathe air, tolerate low oxygen, and survive in polluted waters.
Although catfish may live in dirty sewage, muddy water, smelly water, garbage water, but it does not like too harsh environment. If the environmental pollution of life is too heavy, it will affect the normal reproduction and healthy growth of catfish, and even if it does not last long, it will be poisoned and die.
In fact, there are many fish that can survive in the sewage, not only catfish, but catfish are only more tolerant. (This also reflects the catfish's adaptability and disease resistance.) ）
In less polluted waters, crucian carp, carp, grass carp, silver carp can grow, even in heavily polluted waters (as long as the fishing is not serious), why only catch the catfish?
Reason four: looks are not pleasing
Catfish are ugly and covered in mucus, and subjectively people are more likely to be associated with horror and nausea. Scaleless fish or some fine scaled fish often have more mucus on the body, but it is actually just a protective liquid.
Not only catfish, like eels and loaches, these are also fish without scales, and the mucus secreted on the surface of the body is important to them. Because the scales on these fish have degenerated, these mucus can only be relied on to protect the skin directly exposed.
In addition, with mucus, the skin of the fish can be impermeable, which is good for maintaining a constant osmotic pressure in the fish. In particular, catfish, with mucus on the body, can make it adapt to changes in the concentration of salt in the water, but also reduce the friction resistance of the water, improve the ability to move; remove bacteria and dirt attached to the fish body.
At the same time, the slippery surface of the body is easy to escape the enemy. Therefore, this mucus is of great significance to the life and survival of catfish.
Reason five: do not understand the variety
Egyptian pond catfish and catfish belong to the same family of fish, the growth environment and habits are the same, but pond mackerel grows quickly, in the process of breeding, the year can reach more than 2 kg.
People who don't eat catfish often, or don't know about catfish, can easily confuse catfish with Egyptian pond catfish, causing catfish to be considered far away. Because the reputation of the Egyptian pond mackerel is too bad.
In fact, it is easy to distinguish between catfish and Egyptian pond catfish. Its identity can be judged by the number of whiskers of the earth catfish, which has two whiskers and the pond catfish has eight whiskers, which is very easy to distinguish.
In addition, the appearance of Egyptian pond catfish, the color and the native catfish are very different, the color of the native catfish is yellow, earth yellow, the price of these catfish is not low. Some people feel that as long as it is catfish, it is Egyptian pond catfish, and they cannot distinguish clearly, which is easy to cause the misunderstanding of catfish to deepen.
Catfish have harmful substances such as heavy metals?
Catfish, an omnivore, are in a relatively high food chain and are indeed more likely to enrich some harmful substances. But this is not a problem unique to catfish, it is a problem that all large animals have, and it is also an inevitable consequence of the food chain.
Judging from the current data, most of the regular culture and catfish in the regular water body do not have safety problems such as heavy metals exceeding the standard, and they can still be eaten with confidence. Most of the catfish we eat now are also farmed. In artificial farming, in order for catfish to grow better, the water quality and feed requirements are also higher, usually the water quality is very good, and the feed used is much better than manure.
Catfish do not know how many years to survive, it is certain that it is much higher than the number of years of human survival, the survival and reproduction of any species, there is a reason, either we feel that it is "dirty" or "dirty".
Why is it dirty? Because we make the environment dirty, it will be dirty, and if we want to make it clean, we must protect the environment more.
Source: High Quality Of Life Home
Editor: Wang Yusi