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Brian Lehrer: Lehrer on WNYC and for this membership drive we are ending most shows with a short deep dive into the marine life living right here in our listening area we have picked six unique species that you might not have expected are in our waterways. Each day we're getting into some of the threats that are impacting each species as well. The waterways more broadly like plastic pollution, rising sea levels, and what happens when the sewers overflow but we've partnered with our friends at The Billion Oyster Project a New York City-based nonprofit that has the goal of restoring 1 billion live oysters to New York Harbor by 2035.

We're talking about all these interesting species the spider crab, the skillet fish which gets its name from its frying pan like shape. Not because it wants you to cook it up. This blubbery animal called the sea squid which we will get to on a later show. Right now we're going to turn to the black fish which is a popular species of edible fish found here in our waters, though you shouldn't eat very much of it according to the public health guidelines. Joining me to talk about this species and why experts don't necessarily recommend that you eat them out of New York harbor is Ben LoGuidice, Remote Setting Manager at the Billion Oyster Project. Hi, Ben welcome to WNYC.

Ben LoGuidice: Hi, thanks for having me Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Many of us have seen people fishing off the pier somewhere in the East River, the Hudson River, wherever in New York waters. How much do people actually fish within New York City? Do you have any idea?

Ben LoGuidice: Quantitatively no but there is a ton of fishing. I myself fish, there's a lot of people fishing off Governors Island. You can frequently see boats in the harbor fishing, so it's definitely popular. Surprisingly there are a lot of good fish to catch in the harbor.

Brian Lehrer: Black fish are a fairly popular catch for anglers in our area but for listeners who've never seen one like me what do they look like?

Ben LoGuidice: Black fish aren't the prettiest fish we have in the harbor. They're a speckled olive-brown with splotchy dark and light patterns. They have really plump bodies so they have big stomachs and they have really big lips as far as fish lips go. They look like they had a bad experience with botox. The females tend to have uneven stripes along their bodies and the males are a little bit more uniform in color with a lighter underbelly.

Brian: Interesting and they look similar to black bass kind of, right?

Ben LoGuidice: Yes. The black sea bass and the tautog blackfish are both darker fish that we see in the New York Harbor. When they're juveniles they can be really hard to tell apart because the coloration is really similar. Things to look for when you're telling the difference is the black sea bass has crimson eyes and they're a little bit more angular in terms of their fins and their body shape. The pelvic and anal fins which are the fins underneath the fish are sharper-looking whereas the tautog blackfish is more plump. Its fins are rounded and it has these really nice brown eyes instead of the red ones.

Brian Lehrer: You know what? We have a caller who wants to sing the praises of blackfish for dinner. Corey in Manhattan, you're on WNYC. Hi Corey.

Corey: Hi, I'm a big fan of blackfish. You'll find it at the best gourmet fish markets like Cinderella when it's in season. It's a delicious fish. It's very firm but it's very flaky not only that it's a very healthy fish to eat because it mainly eats crabs and other crustaceans. It's not concentrating mercury like some of the bigger fish do. I've been listening to Brian unfortunately giving it a bad wrap all week but it's one of the best fish you can get. The East River is actually, a lot of people fish in the East River because it's a tidal race, not a river. It gets cleaned out every day that when they tide comes through at Hell's gate, the tide is moving at six knots which is like seven and a half miles an hour.

Brian Lehrer: Corey I'm going to leave it there for time but thank you for all of that. Do you want to comment on what he just said? Do you at The Billion Oyster Project keep tabs on the public health recommendations for how much of what fish the officials do consider it okay to eat out of New York City waters.

Ben LoGuidice: Yes. Absolutely. What he was saying is definitely right that in terms of the mercury levels they are lower. They're not a predatory fish that's eating other fish. They're lower on the trophic levels but one of the reasons that we advise against eating them is because of what they eat. This is just in the New York Harbor other places they are truly phenomenal fish and they taste fantastic. In the New York Harbor they're eating the filter feeders mostly. They're eating the clams and the mussels and those animals are filtering everything that's in the water even not good stuff that we find in the harbor and those filter feeders are ingesting that.

Then when the blackfish goes and eats it, they in turn are ingesting that as well and then if we're to catch them and eat them, then we could be ingesting that also. Other types of predatory fish it's a little bit harder to say because like the striped bass swims a lot more than the blackfish does. It's harder to say if they've been in the harbor or if they've been out in the open ocean when you catch them. For things like oysters, for things like clams and even blackfish, the stuff that we know is sedentary we would advise against eating that out of the harbor.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. You can ask your local fish market, the proprietor there where the fish are caught you don't always get a really good answer. They will sometimes tell you for sure. As we talk about some of the interesting details about this species the blackfish according to Guides Lee a mobile app that connects people who want to go fishing to fishing guides, blackfish are super slimy which helps them hunt for their prey related to what Corey was just saying because of what they eat, they don't have as much mercury as some other species. Can you explain a little more about their diet and why they have to be so slimy to catch their prey?

Ben LoGuidice: Yes, so they really do eat shellfish almost exclusively. You think clams, crabs, mussels, barnacles that sort of thing.

Brian Lehrer: These are not kosher fish these blackfish.

Ben LoGuidice: They are not but a lot of that food lives in sharp and rocky places. That rubbery skin and the slimy coating helps them from getting cut up as they're swimming in and out of either oyster reefs or like jetties and stuff like that. Those big lips that I mentioned before actually help them when they're trying to pull a mussel off of the rock. It helps them from cutting up their face. If they're trying to eat a crab, it helps them from getting the rest of their face pinched. It's one of their first defense mechanisms so that's why they have this plump rubbery slimy body.

Brian Lehrer: Because they eat shellfish they have some pretty strong teeth including a second set in an unexpected place I see.

Ben LoGuidice: In the front of their mouth they have teeth that are pretty similar to ours. They have incisors and what they do is it helps them grab onto something and either rip it off a rock or get a good grip to get into the back of their throat. Then in the back of their throat they actually have a second set of teeth that look like human molars and these help grind down those hard calcium-based shells. When they swallow it they don't actually hurt themselves when they start to digest their food.

Brian Lehrer: Another name for blackfish that some of our listeners know because somebody already tweeted it is tautog and according to a 1903 book titled American Fishes that name comes from the native Americans who lived on present-day Long Island Connecticut and Massachusetts. Can you explain what tribe the name comes from and is it more or less a popular name for the fish?

Ben LoGuidice: Yes. It came from the Negan tribe and language and honestly it's mixed in really well with the other names. Depending on where you are or who you're talking to in the Northeast you'll hear it called a blackfish, a tautog, a tog, a chub, or a bunch of other names. It's really location-based.

Brian Lehrer: Fascinating. All right. We will leave it there for today. My guest has been Ben LoGuidice, Remote Setting Manager at the Billion Oyster Project. Thanks so much for coming on.

Ben LoGuidice: Thanks a lot Brian.

Brian Lehrer: That was super fun and tune in on Monday to hear all about spider crabs. They've got taste buds on their feet as we continue our series on the fish that live in the New York waterways.

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