{"id":263,"date":"2009-03-17T09:07:36","date_gmt":"2009-03-17T12:07:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scienceblogs.com.br\/uoleo\/2009\/03\/candiru\/"},"modified":"2009-03-17T09:07:36","modified_gmt":"2009-03-17T12:07:36","slug":"candiru","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.blogs.unicamp.br\/uoleo\/2009\/03\/17\/candiru\/","title":{"rendered":"Candiru (or the-fish-you-don’t-want-to-get-intimate-with)"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is the english version of a post written in portuguese, which can be found here<\/a>.<\/em>
\nTwo fish are the stuff of nightmares in the Amazon region: the piranha<\/a> and the candiru<\/a>. The former is the carnivore that has sharp teeth and is attracted to blood, like small river sharks, while the later is a parasite that is attracted to urea and has a head that works like a hook.
\nOh, yeah…
\nPiranhas kill in the traditional way: chewing your meat until there’s nothing left but partially-cleaned bones and a temporally satisfied school.
\nThe candiru<\/a>, in turn, kills in an innovative way: They freak you out dead.
\nBut not the kind of freak-out that makes the freak so chic. Oh, no. This is much worse.
\nThe fish, which is thicker than it should be, enters the urethra of people trying to relieve themselves in the river.
\nSo why would this animal do such an evil thing?
\nNot on purpose, that’s for sure.
\nThe candiru doesn’t really cares for willys. It is a temporary parasite that attaches itself to other fish for a few minutes in order to feast on their blood.
\nThe victims excrete ammonia and urea from their gills, which attract the sucker. When the candiru reaches the gills, it hooks itself to an artery, where blood will be pumped into itself via the prey’s blood pressure.
\nClever, ay?
\nThe fish smell urea and ammonia dissolved in the river, like piranhas smell blood and bouncers smell fear.
\nHowever, when Candiru gets into the human urethra, nothing happens since it can’t suck blood, like mosquitoes do. Unless there is positive pressure pushing blood down its throat, it cannot eat.
\nFor the candiru, the human urethra is like the soup bowl for the crane<\/a>.
\nWhen the little bugger realises there’s no blood coming, it relaxes and tries to get out.
\nHowever, it’s too late: by that time, the owner of the urinary passage is already running like hell through the forest with his apendage safely shelled in between his hands, crying.
\nIf this image<\/a> doesn’t stop you from relieving yourself in the Amazon river, I don’t know what’s what.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is the english version of a post written in portuguese, which can be found here. Two fish are the stuff of nightmares in the Amazon region: the piranha and the candiru. The former is the carnivore that has sharp teeth and is attracted to blood, like small river sharks, while the later is a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":482,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"pgc_sgb_lightbox_settings":"","_vp_format_video_url":"","_vp_image_focal_point":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-geral"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blogs.unicamp.br\/uoleo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blogs.unicamp.br\/uoleo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blogs.unicamp.br\/uoleo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blogs.unicamp.br\/uoleo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/482"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blogs.unicamp.br\/uoleo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=263"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.blogs.unicamp.br\/uoleo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.blogs.unicamp.br\/uoleo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blogs.unicamp.br\/uoleo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.blogs.unicamp.br\/uoleo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}