European anchovy

European anchovy ( Engraulis encrasicolus )

The European anchovy ( Engraulis encrasicolus ) is a small fish from the order of herring -like. It occurs to Angola, including the North Sea, Skagerrak and Kattegat, the Mediterranean, and the Black Sea in the eastern Atlantic from Scotland. There were also occurrences in St. Helena and Estonia, as well as in the Indian Ocean in Mauritius, the Seychelles and reported in the upwelling off the coast of Somalia. Also scattered specimens were found in the Suez Canal and the Gulf of Suez. The fish has a wide tolerance to salinity of waters and can tolerate a salt content of 0.5 to 4.1 percent.

Genus and species names come from ancient Greek: engraulis (Greek ἐγγραυλίς ) and encrasicolus ( Latinized from enkrasicholos ἐγκρασίχολος, initially written by Linné mistakenly wrong) are both names for the anchovy, the latter means about, mingled with gall ', with reference to the sharp taste.

Features

European anchovies are slender and elongated. They can be up to 20 inches long, but rarely achieve a length of about 16 centimeters. In the southern part of the range, they remain small. The population in the Azov Sea is only ten inches long. The caudal fin is clearly notched.

Fins formula: Dorsal 16-18, 13-15 Anal

Way of life

The European anchovy forms large flocks, which mainly reside in shallow water and percolation water by zooplankton, mainly copepods, and phytoplankton. At high plankton density, they opened their big mouth wide open and drive as with their spanned gills Reuse through the water. Otherwise, they catch the plankton on individually.

In summer, the flocks migrate north in the winter and go back to southern waters. In the North Sea and the English Channel is the spawning season from June to August in the Mediterranean from April to September. For spawning often lagoons and estuaries are visited. The females lay 13000-20000 oval eggs, which float in the top 50 meters of the water column. After 24 to 65 hours to slip the fish larvae.

Economic Importance

The European anchovy is of great importance for fishing. They are caught with purse seines, trawls and fishing lantern. The flesh of the fat little fish tastes bitter and is therefore usually salted and as piquant and spicy cooking ingredient ( anchovies ) are offered. By salting the fish are not only preserved, it also uses a fermentation that they " cooked ". Here, improve quality and flavor during storage of often more than two years. Traded anchovies mainly as fillets in coarse sea salt or salt or vegetable oil. Your taste is milder after they have been inserted some time in milk or warm water. Mashed and mixed with oil and spices, they are offered as anchovy paste in tubes.

Fresh anchovies are popular especially in the Mediterranean - they are baked and eaten whole.