Why are pike fry so dangerous to muskie fry?
It is a pure arithmetic ambush. Pike spawn at 4–10 °C (40–50 °F) and muskie at 9–15 °C (48–59 °F), so by the time muskie eggs hatch, pike fry from the same bays are two to four weeks old — 3–5 cm (1–2 in) of fast, gape-ready predator whose ideal prey size is exactly a newly hatched muskie. Both species' fry are obligate fish-eaters within weeks, but only one side gets to do the eating. Studies of failed muskie recruitment repeatedly point at this nursery overlap, more than adult competition or habitat, and it is the standard mechanism cited when pike introductions collapse muskie lakes.
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