{"id":97163,"date":"2026-04-08T14:46:14","date_gmt":"2026-04-08T09:16:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=97163"},"modified":"2026-04-08T14:46:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-08T09:16:14","slug":"shellear-fish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/shellear-fish\/","title":{"rendered":"Shellear fish"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><b>Shellear fish Latest News<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Recently, scientists have confirmed that shellear fish climb vertical waterfall 15 metres (50 feet) tall in the Democratic Republic of Congo in a behaviour \u200bthat illustrates the surprising and ingenious ways animals can adapt to extreme environments.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>About Shellear fish<\/b><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Shellear fish, whose <\/span><b>scientific \u200cname is Parakneria thysi.<\/b><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is found in the <\/span><b>upper <a href=\"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/congo-basin\/\" target=\"_blank\">Congo Basin<\/a>, <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">(Particularly Luvilombo Falls on the Luvilombo River)<\/span><\/li>\n<li><b>Habitat:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> It is a benthopelagic; freshwater species.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><b>Size:<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> These fish are tiny 37\u201348 mm-long that can grow up to a size of around 96 mm.<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It scales the <\/span><b>Luvilombo Falls in the upper Congo Basin.<\/b><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Shellear&#8217;s climbing abilities are made possible by tiny, hook-like projections on specialized pads on <\/span><b>their pectoral and pelvic fins,<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> along with <\/span><b>hypertrophied muscles<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> that enable them to carry their weight.<\/span><\/li>\n<li aria-level=\"1\"><b>Why do they do it?<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"list-style-type: none;\">\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"2\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The researchers said the fish may climb upstream to find <\/span><b>suitable living conditions<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and areas of the waterway with<\/span><b> less<\/b> <b>competition and fewer predators.<\/b><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The researchers identified two <\/span><b>major human threats to the species:<\/b>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"2\"><b>Illegal fishing<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> using fine-mesh mosquito nets that can easily catch the fish,<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"2\"><b>Water extraction<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> for irrigation which has in some years depleted the Luvilombo River<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/business\/environment\/thousands-small-fish-defy-gravity-climb-congo-waterfall-2026-04-07\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Reuters<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Shellear fish in Congo climbs vertical waterfalls using suction-like fins, highlighting rare evolutionary adaptation and threats from fishing and water extraction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":97175,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[3815,21,6701,23],"class_list":{"0":"post-97163","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"tag-prelims-pointer","9":"tag-prelims-pointers","10":"tag-shellear-fish","11":"tag-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","12":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97163"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97163\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":97239,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97163\/revisions\/97239"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/97175"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}