This page is dedicated to the history of the pike,spawning behaviour,growth rates and feeding habits etc...
The pike(esox-lucius)is a species that dates back to the ice age and is widespread across northern europe and northern america,and strains of pike are even found in spain,turkey and russia!
in countries like france,germany,holland and north america they commonly grow to vast weights in excess of 40-50lbs,however in the uk and especially scotland they rarely exceed a weight of 30-35lbs.
the really large pike are all females the male pike rarely exceeds a weight of 8-10lbs
The pike is a predator eating small prey fish such as perch,roach,trout and small pike and will occasionally eat frogs and small wildfowl as well,the pike needs to eat 1.4x its own body weight a year to survive,2.5x its own bodyweight to show healthy growth and in rivers depending on the flow of the current as much as 5x its weight to show a healthy growth,the pike will sometimes sporadically feed during daylight but main feeding spells are dusk and dawn
The pike can be found in lochs,lakes,ponds canals and rivers(usually slow moving),and hunt by smell,sight and vibration and are usually found lurking in weedbeds and patrolling underwater ledges (drop offs),where they will attack their target with a short sharp burst of speed usually attacking the small fish from the underneath,where it traps its prey with its rearwards pointing teeth before running off to swallow the meal.
The pike lives for a maximum of 18-20 years,reaches sexual maturity after 2-3 years spawns between march-may (allthough it may be as late as june or so on some of the highland waters) usually depending on a water temprature of 6-10 celcius needed to trigger spawning,pike will travel a distance of 5 miles or so to an other area of the water to spawn where spawning takes place in long reeds,flooded fields and marshland where the females are capable of releasing 15,000-30,000 eggs per kilogram of bodyweight
After spawning it is not uncommon for the pike to go on a feeding frenzy and not unknown for the larger females to devour several jacks(smaller males) before dissapearing into deeper water to recover from the exertions of spawning....
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