Featured Image Credit: Facebook/Bluewater Lakes
Topics: France, World News, Animals
Poppy Bilderbeck
People are flooding to social media in awe after a fisherman hooked a ridiculously gigantic fish.
If 2023 ran away with you and you forgot to get your kid anything this Christmas so resorted to buying them the first pet they've begged for their whole life, but refused to get them anything bigger than a fish, well, you may've shot yourself in the foot.
You should hope and pray what you got them was definitely a goldfish and not a hybrid version because it turns out fish can get a hell of a lot bigger than most of us would expect.
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As long as it's not a hybrid and you make sure to keep your kid's new pet fish indoors in a 'small fish aquarium,' thankfully, it shouldn't get too out of hand to manage.
According to A-Z Animals, when goldfish are kept as pets in small tanks, they 'tend to remain just about 1-2 inches long and never become bigger than six inches'.
"In a pond, goldfish can grow as big as 2 to 10 inches and weigh about 5-9 pounds. They could even grow bigger in the wild if they had adequate space and resources," it adds.
And just wait until you realize how big certain types of goldfish can get when they enter the wild - just as one man found out after he hooked one.
A-Z Animals notes in the wild the fish can attain a length of 'up to 12 and 14 inches'.
And a British angler named Andy Hackett proved goldfish-lookalikes are capable of even more after he caught a hybrid version in Bluewater Lakes in Champagne, France.
In 2022, Bluewater Lakes Facebook page shared images of Hackett and his catch of the day, revealing he caught a ginormous fish - nicknamed 'The Carrot' - which weighed a staggering 67.4lbs (30.5kg).
The fish - a mixture between a leather and koi carp, with carp 'the base species for both goldfish and koi', as per Tampa Bay Ponds and Rocks - was first placed in the lakes by Jason Cowler 20 years prior.
He told People at the time: "We put The Carrot in about 20 years ago as something different for the customers to fish for. Since then it has grown and grown but it doesn't often come out. She is very elusive."
Hackett managed to pull The Carrot from the lake after a 25-minute struggle, BBC News reports.
Hackett reflected: "I always knew The Carrot was there but never thought I would catch it. [...] It was brilliant to catch it but it was also sheer luck."
You'll be glad - or slightly frightened - to know The Carrot was later released back into the water to continue growing big and strong.