Parques de Portugal

<p> <em>Lampetra fluviatilis</em> (Linnaeus, 1758)</p>

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  • River lamprey

  • Lampetra fluviatilis (Linnaeus, 1758)

  • Petromyzontidae

  • The river lamprey is an anadromous migrating fish with a serpentine body and a smooth grey skin, darker in the dorsal surface. It has gill orifices and a suction cup shaped mouth, with the teeth arranged in a crown shape. It does not present pectoral fins. It can measure up to 25 cm long.

  • Estuário do Tejo Nature Reserve

  • Lisboa e Vale do Tejo

  • Critically endangered

  • The river lamprey lives on the sea, migrating to big rivers with clean and well oxygenated water, with a sandy riverbed, to reproduce. The larva prefer fresh or brackish water with a muddy riverbed, where they bury themselves for five years, migrating to the sea after the metamorphosis. The estuaries are passageways in the migration.

  • Spring and Summer

  • The river lamprey has an hematophagous (feeds on blood) diet at sea, being parasitic to fish, but, when it returns to the rivers, it stops feeding. The larvae are filter feeders.

  • The Portuguese population of this species is estimated to be smaller than 3 thousand adults.