Large Pacu at the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago. Photo: I, Omnitarian

Here's another fish story via the Schuylkill Action Network: An article in last weekend's Mercury reported that a 22-year-old fisherman caught a pacu—a South American freshwater fish related to the piranha—in the Schuylkill River near Pottstown on Aug. 1. The angler, Josh Carmean, initially thought he'd hooked a two-pound catfish until he examined the fish's teeth.

"Pacu and piranha have similar teeth, but their jaw alignments are different. The piranha also have pointed, razor-sharp teeth with a pronounced underbite, while pacu have squarer and more straighter teeth with a less severe underbite. Also, sources reveal, the pacu are much larger than piranha, some reaching up to 60 pounds or more in the wild.

Pacus are also known to 'eat anything,' according to Deep Sea World zoological manager Matthew Kane. Though not the aggressive carnivores like piranha, the pacu's crushing jaw system can be hazardous. They are often sold to home aquarium owners as 'vegetarian piranhas.'

The pacu may have gotten a bad name as a result of owners illegally releasing them into wild waterways. Once in those waterways, like the Schuylkill River, they can dominate other species vying for available food and other resources, even displace some by introducing exotic parasites or diseases."

Pottstown is upstream from Philadelphia on the Schuylkill, the same river that will host the 2011 Philly Fun Fishing Fest on September 10. Did we mention that registration is free and now open? Might there be a special award to the angler who lands a pacu?

Photo: Tom Avril/Philadelphia Inquirer

We neglected to mention this Philadelphia Inquirer story from two weeks ago, in which a group of teenaged summer interns at the Cobbs Creek Environmental Education Center solved the mystery of a fish kill in the West Philadelphia waterway. Following the creek upstream, 10th grader Kamal Gatewood (pictured, above) caught the scent of chlorine, originating from the drainage pipe of a municipal swimming pool.

"'We could smell it from about 20 feet away,' the 15-year-old [Gatewood] said.

The trio said they tested the drainage water with a portable test kit. They added chemicals to their water samples, causing them to change color, which they then checked on a chart that revealed the chlorine level. It read more than five parts per million. Fish can be killed by levels less than one-tenth that amount, according to a Duke University website. However, those readings were taken directly from the drainage pipe; the water in the creek was much more diluted.

At the suggestion of Singh and Kurnick, sewer repair workers agreed to move the pipe so it drained into a sewer grate."

Stay tuned for more news on this watershed detective work.

A member of the Miss Rockaway Armada at the Schuylkill launch site (Photo: Tod Seelie)

Today's Philadelphia Inquirer featured a trifecta of water and watershed-related news:

On the front page, reporter Sandy Bauers details the detective work the Philadelphia Water Department is doing to track down the source of iodine-131 levels observed in the Wissahickon in the spring. The prime suspect? Iodine-131 that is present in medication used to treat thyroid cancer. Full article

"Officials from the Water Department, the EPA, and the DEP emphasize that the levels detected are tiny and don't constitute a public health threat. Philadelphia's drinking water meets standards for radioactivity and remains safe, they say. Even if it was getting into streams above Philadelphia, iodine-131 has such a short half-life - half the radioactivity is gone after eight days - that amounts would be much reduced by the time they were swept downstream.

But, said Chris Crockett, the Water Department's deputy commissioner of environmental services, 'we don't want any iodine-131 in our water. I don't want it there for me or my kids and my family. And I don't want it for our neighbors and citizens.'"

Be sure to read our Iodine-131 Q&A for PWD's official word on the topic. Once again, Philadelphia's drinking water is safe to drink.

Elsewhere, a group of artists known as the Miss Rockaway Armada is building a salvaged-materials flotilla/performance space for a September art installation in the Schuylkill and Delaware. Commissioned by the Philadelphia Art Alliance, the installation features music, theatrical performances and ... oh, just go here and try to figure it out. Full article

"'This project is more about reinterpreting the water space in Philadelphia,' [said Tod Seelie]. 'The experience of breaking the shore-to-water barrier and actually being in the water has a lot more implications than you might think.'"

Photo: Southern Liberties, LLC

The Philadelphia Water Department would never utter an unkind word about traditional rain barrels, but the sleek, ultra-modern version (they call it a "rain column") by local company Shift Space Design is making rain collection a whole lot more attractive. The stainless steel, 58-gallon tank isn't cheap (one online retailer has it listed at $1,800), but it sure is nice to look at. It even has its own name: Fitzwater. More detailed photos and specs here. (There's also a 12-gallon version named Wallace.) For the rest of us, a blue or green plastic barrel may just have to do.

The rain column pictured above (in the backyard of Montrose Green, a Philadelphia rowhome/eco-design utopia) is actually part of a collection system; the column on the left is connected to trickle rods that water the planter below.

Read more about rain barrels and check out our Rain Barrel Map to see where Philadelphians are collecting runoff and keeping our streams and rivers clean.