Snakehead: A Fish out of Water

by Eric Jay Dolin

The story of the dreaded snakehead fish is a case study for invasive species. This is the story of an invasive species that went from obscurity to fame, becoming front-page news and the topic of David Letterman's Top Ten list. Snakeheads, a species native to Asia, were released into a suburban pond in Maryland sometime around the year 2000. They reproduced, and a few years later a local angler caught and photographed one of the adults. Natural resources officials from the state and federal government responded with swat teams, and a media frenzy soon followed. Could the ferocious beast — capable of walking on land and breathing air — enter Chesapeake Bay and destroy native stocks? Much of the excitement was exaggeration, but the frenzy continued. Wildlife officers could not catch the beasts, even as local anglers captured more. The pond was sealed off, armies with toxins brought in, and over the course of months it looked like the beast was slain. But we learned that snakeheads are loose elsewhere in America, as are thousands of other introduced species. Was the snakehead story all hype, or was this the right response? Dolin tells the amazing story of the "snakehead summer" while delving into the larger questions about invasive species in America.

"Fascinating scientific reporting . . . well-written and entertaining case study of modern resource management." ESPN Outdoors

"It's the best book on non-native species since The Coming of the Pond Fishes . . . an absolute page turner!" ifish.net

"A wonderful, intriguing and fascinatingly complete documentation of a social and ecological phenomenon." New Scientist

"Dolin doesn't skimp on details . . . Or get bogged down in an overly scientific discussion of his subject . . . a lively book." Baltimore Magazine

Genres: Nonfiction, Animals

266 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 2003

About the author

BELOW ARE TWO VERSIONS OF MY BIOGRAPHY: THE SHORT ONE I USE FOR INTRODUCTIONS TO MY BOOK TALKS, AND THE LONGER VERSION, WHICH GOES A BIT DEEPER ON MY BACKGROUND, AND HOW I BECAME A WRITER. 

SHORT

Eric Jay Dolin is the author of seventeen books, including Leviathan: The History of Whaling in America; A Furious Sky: The Five-Hundred-Year History of America’s Hurricanes; Black Flags, Blue Waters: The Epic History of America’s Most Notorious Pirates; and Rebels at Sea: Privateering in the American Revolution. His forthcoming book (June 2, 2026), is The Wreck of the Mentor: A True Story of Death, Despair, and Deliverance in the Age of Sail. Dolin's books have won many awards including the John Lyman Award for U.S. Maritime History; Fraunces Tavern Museum Book Award; National Society Daughters of the American Revolution Excellence in American History Book Award for Adult Nonfiction; Samuel Eliot Morison Book Award for Naval Literature; L. Byrne Waterman Book Award for Outstanding Contributions to Research and Pedagogy in the Arts, Humanities, and Sciences; James P. Hanlan Book Award; and the Outdoor Writers Association of America Book Award. Many of his books have been chosen as “must reads” by the Massachusetts Center for the Book. Other honors include being chosen as a finalist for the Kirkus Prize, and as one of the best books of the year by The Los Angeles Times, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, Kirkus Reviews, the Library Journal, and Booklist. Dolin lives in Marblehead, Massachusetts, with his family.

LONGER

I grew up near the coasts of New York and Connecticut, and since an early age I was fascinated by the natural world, especially the ocean. I spent many days wandering the beaches on the edge of Long Island Sound and the Atlantic, collecting seashells and exploring tidepools. When I left for college I wanted to become a marine biologist or more specifically a malacologist (seashell scientist). At Brown University I quickly realized that although I loved learning about science, I wasn't cut out for a career in science, mainly because I wasn't very good in the lab, and I didn't particularly enjoy reading or writing scientific research papers. So, after taking a year off and exploring a range of career options, I shifted course turning toward the field of environmental policy, first earning a double-major in biology and environmental studies, then getting a masters degree in environmental management from Yale, and a Ph.D. in environmental policy and planning from MIT, where my dissertation focused on the role of the courts in the cleanup of Boston Harbor.

I have held a variety of jobs, including stints as a fisheries policy analyst at the National Marine Fisheries Service, a program manager at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, an environmental consultant stateside and in London, an American Association for the Advancement of Science writing fellow at Business Week, a curatorial assistant in the Mollusk Department at Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology, and an intern at the National Wildlife Federation, the Massachusetts Office of Coastal Zone Management, and the U.S. Senate.

Throughout my career, one thing remained constant--I enjoyed writing and telling stories. And that's why I started writing books--to share the stories that I find most intriguing (I have also published more than 60 articles for magazines, newspapers, and professional journals). My most recent books include:

***The Wreck of the Mentor: A True Story of Death, Despair, and Deliverance in the Age of Sail (Liveright, June 2, 2026).

***Left For Dead: Shipwreck, Treachery, and Survival at the Edge of the World (Liveright, 2024), which was selected by the editors at Amazon as one of the best history books of the year. 

***Rebels at Sea: Privateering in the American Revolution (Liveright, 2022), which was winner of the 2023 Fraunces Tavern Museum Book Award, the Samuel Eliot Morison Award for Naval Literature, the Nation

Reviews

[Fishface · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great read. Traces the 'Summer of the Snakehead' -- 2002 -- chronologically, according to the rising arc of the crazy stories circulating about the fearsome powers of Channa argus, the Northern Snakeheads released into Crofton Pond. Includes everything from the text of the "Daily Show's" on-location Snakehead piece to anatomically-correct artists' illustrations from the better science books. This fine volume even touches on the Snakeheads of the Sixties (the Walking Catfish), Seventies (Killers Bees and Sea Lampreys) and the Teens (Asian Carp), comparing and contrasting the hysteria and hyperbole. Not to be missed if you love ecological studies, ridiculous public panics, or anything having to do with piscatorial love.

[Glenn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was a little skeptical when I began this book, because Dolin says he wrote it in just six months. As a journalist turned environmental historian, I think six months is insufficient time to research a book, never mind write one. But Dolin actually did a good job. In 2002, at a small suburban pond in Maryland, a couple of anglers caught specimens of a large, ugly, and aggressive Asian fish called snakehead. All hell broke loose, as state and federal agencies responded with "SWAT teams of biologists," and national media carried exaggerated stories that turned Frankenfish into an international celebrity. The fish provided comic fodder for the likes of Dave Barry, David Letterman, and Jon Stewart. Dolin sometimes overwhelms the reader with too many excerpts from the media frenzy, to the point of drowning its core themes. Nonetheless, 'Snakehead' is an engaging read, with interesting characters, drama, rhetoric, and plenty of humor. Above all, it conveys an important underlying message about the risks of invasive species, an issue that concerned few Americans until the summer of the snakehead.

[Zeke Gonzalez · Rating 4 out of 5]

As someone who has been doing research on the northern snakehead for almost four years now, it was incredibly serendipitous to stumble across this book. I found this book to be a fun and largely comprehensive account of the Crofton Pond Incident. However, while the work is mostly a fun and engaging narrative, Dolin does occasionally leave the main issue behind in favor of repetitive and boring interludes on material only very tangentially related. That said, the book is well-researched and very thoroughly explores the discovery of snakehead and the ensuing media storm that accompanied it.