Q 01/05

An adult American paddlefish can top 100 pounds while feeding almost entirely on which food, strained from the water?

A) Minnows

B) Zooplankton

C) River snails

D) Tadpoles

Answer · why

B) Zooplankton

Zooplankton is nearly all an adult American paddlefish eats: water fleas, copepods and other specks. Because it never bites at bait, anglers cannot te...

Q 02/05

The long paddle of an American paddlefish is covered in thousands of receptors that detect what from its prey?

A) Chemical scent trails

B) Traces of body heat

C) Reflected sound waves

D) Electric fields

Answer · why

D) Electric fields

Electric fields are what the paddle reads, picking up the faint signals that living animals give off. The sense is fine enough to register the leg mov...

Q 03/05

Polyodon, the genus name a French naturalist gave the American paddlefish, is Greek for which trait?

A) Many teeth

B) Many fins

C) Many scales

D) Many spines

Answer · why

A) Many teeth

Many teeth is the meaning, yet adults have none at all. The name is thought to nod to the fine comb-like filters that strain the fish's food.

Q 04/05

Which label is often given to the American paddlefish, the last surviving member of an ancient family?

A) Missing links

B) Keystone species

C) Living fossils

D) Apex predators

Answer · why

C) Living fossils

Living fossils fits because the family goes back at least 120 million years, about as far as flowering plants. Only one species of it is left on Earth...

Q 05/05

The American paddlefish, last survivor of its family, is native to the basin of which North American river?

A) Saskatchewan

B) Mississippi

C) Colorado

D) Columbia

Answer · why

B) Mississippi

Mississippi country is home, though the fish have vanished from the edges of their old range, including the Great Lakes and New York.