Do snakeheads walk on land and breathe air?
Northern snakeheads do not walk on land. Their pectoral fins (on the sides of the fish, just behind the head) lack spines, and have only soft rays. Thus, they have no ‘legs’ to propel them forward. Some species of snakehead (there are close to 30) are known to travel short distances over flat, muddy ground, but the northern snakehead is not among them. A northern snakehead placed on a gently sloping bank can probably wiggle back down into the water (and thus all snakeheads caught in the Potomac River should be killed by removing the head or viscera), but couldn’t have made it up the bank in the first place without assistance. Other native fishes, such as American eel, are far more able to travel across land than northern snakeheads. In my many hours on the water, spent tracking radio-tagged northern snakehead and electrofishing, I have only seen two fish on land. Both were hiding in weed beds in less than a foot of water next to a very gently sloping muddy bank. Both exploded out of th
