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The ruffe (Gymnocephalus cernua), also known as the Eurasian ruffe or pope, is a freshwater fish found in temperate regions of Europe and northern Asia. It has been introduced into the Great Lakes of North America, reportedly with unfortunate results, as it is invasive and is reproducing faster than other species. Its common names are ambiguous – "ruffe" may refer to any local member of its genus Gymnocephalus, which as a whole is native to Eurasia. The ruffe's colors and markings are similar to those of the walleye, an olive-brown to golden-brown color on its back, paler on the sides with yellowish white undersides. The ruffe can reach up to in length, but is usually around half that size. It is a very aggressive fish for its size. The ruffe also has a large, spiny dorsal fin which is likely distasteful to its predators. It also has two fins on top, the front fin has hard and sharp spines, the back fin has soft spines called rays. The most obvious features to recognize a ruffe are the ruffe's large, continuous dorsal fin and its slightly downturned mouth. The species occurs in the basins of the Caspian, Black, Aral, Baltic and North Sea, and is also found in Great Britain, parts of Scandinavia and some regions of the Arctic Ocean basin eastward to the drainage of the Kolyma. It has been introduced to parts of Western Europe (France, northern Italy) and Greece, as well as to the North American Great Lakes. In Eurasia, the ruffe diet mainly consists of zoobenthos: chironomids, small aquatic bugs and larvae, which are all found in the benthic zone of the water column. As far as researchers have been able to learn, it has kept the same diet in its transfer to the Great Lakes. The ruffe has the capacity to reproduce at an extremely high rate. A ruffe usually matures in two to three years, but a ruffe that lives in warmer waters has the ability to reproduce in the first year of life. A single female has the potential to lay from 130,000 to 200,000 eggs annually. Ruffe will leave the deep dark water where they prefer and journey to warmer shallow water for spawning.

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Related concepts (4)

Caspian Sea

The Caspian Sea is the world's largest inland body of water, often described as the world's largest lake or a full-fledged sea. An endorheic basin, it lies between Europe and Asia: east of the Caucasus, west of the broad steppe of Central Asia, south of the fertile plains of Southern Russia in Eastern Europe, and north of the mountainous Iranian Plateau of West Asia. It covers a surface area of (excluding the highly saline lagoon of Garabogazköl to its east), an area approximately equal to that of Japan, with a volume of .

Ruffe

Baltic Sea

The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden and the North and Central European Plain. The sea stretches from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from 10°E to 30°E longitude. It is a shelf sea and marginal sea of the Atlantic with limited water exchange between the two, making it an inland sea. The Baltic Sea drains through the Danish Straits into the Kattegat by way of the Øresund, Great Belt and Little Belt.