Super Zoo

About how to "arrange" those five big fish, Suming had considered it as well.

The smallest of these fish weighed just over 100 jin (approximately 50 kg), with the largest green fish reaching 180 jin (approximately 90 kg); they definitely couldn't be treated like ordinary fish, killed for their meat or sold off.

In modern society, it is exceedingly rare for fish to grow so large; it would take at least several decades. According to the elder generation, such large fish have "spiritual power" and killing them would be an inauspicious act.

As for releasing them, that's nonsense. Not to mention that Suming had bought them with his own money, even if he did release them, they might be caught by someone downstream in a few days after being released upstream.
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These days, with sand dredgers and fishing boats everywhere, severe pollution, and the wild living environment of animals being horribly destroyed, these fish would probably not have as good a life in the wild as they would following Suming.

In the end, Suming was not someone with an entirely noble and righteous backbone; he frankly couldn't be bothered to do things that involved sacrificing his interests for the greater good.

Under normal circumstances, capturing such big fish usually leads to an exhibition with an entrance fee. People seek novelty, and these enormous fish, all five of them, would certainly attract plenty willing to pay to see them.

Suming thought further ahead, possessing the ability to befriend animals, it would be too wasteful to merely use such large fish for exhibition purposes.

As he had told that reporter, he indeed wanted to develop a "fish-riding" attraction.

Riding horses is common, but riding fish is an unprecedented idea; no zoos around the world, including places like Disney, have a fish-riding attraction.

Maintaining horses is expensive; a batch of good horses is costly by itself, and with feed and maintenance, the investment is significant. Moreover, horse riding is relatively more dangerous and not widespread in China.

Big fish, on the other hand, are different. The five fish combined cost less than ten thousand yuan, while just one leg of a decent horse is worth more than that. Daily feeding is easy to manage; they would eat whatever is in the lake, are unlikely to get sick, and are very easy to keep alive.

Therefore, the prospects for the fish-riding attraction are undeniable.

But to truly create a fish-riding attraction that is both safe and fun, the conditions are not yet ripe.

With Suming's spiritual power to control them, riding these big fish would be no issue, but that doesn't mean others could ride them too. If someone else tried, the big fish simply wouldn't comply, and Suming would need to slowly "train" them.

Beyond that, management issues also need to be resolved. Like the boat ride attraction, the fish-riding attraction would definitely require management by professionals with specific knowledge.

Typical aquarium attendants could handle this job, but Yangchuan City Zoo is so poor it can hardly make ends meet, having barely any decent aquatic animals, let alone 'high-end configurations' like an aquarium, thus no aquarium attendants.

It's not that there are no aquatic animals; in fact, the zoo has many, all residing in Shuijun Lake. Although there are no rare protected species, there are enough in quantity.

The fish-riding project is temporarily unable to launch. Not just fish riding, but even the boat ride business has been temporarily suspended due to the arrival of the finless porpoises, to avoid startling the injured porpoise.

Professor Chu, true to his word, allocated two thousand yuan from the research funds to compensate Suming for his financial losses during this period.

"Two thousand yuan..."

Suming felt speechless while holding the money. He didn't even mention the loss from the boat ride business—just the fish that the two young dolphins had eaten recently probably amounted to more than two thousand yuan.

These two youngsters lived up to their reputation as "Love for Life," indeed having appetites as enormous as pigs. Despite their small size, only slightly bigger than babies, they did nothing but play and eat from morning to night, consuming several large buckets of food each day.

There's a saying that a child without a mother is the most pitiable, but for Suming it was quite the opposite. He couldn't bear to treat these two guys poorly and wouldn't let them eat the four major types of fish from the lake. Instead, he would go to the market every day and specially buy foods like grenadiers, big silverfish, and bass, which happen to be the dolphins' favorite foods.

Both God and the constitution say that all men are created equal, and by that logic, animals should be equal, too.

In reality, that's complete nonsense.

Just as people with good looks receive preferential treatment everywhere, as two of the world's few remaining wild dolphins, the treatment of the two dolphin calves was the best in the entire Yangchuan City Zoo.

After a few days, these two rascals had become picky eaters and turned their noses up at the ordinary fish in the lake.

Nevertheless, Suming really couldn't complain about the lack of money. Just for this 2000 yuan subsidy, the research team had to organize a discussion meeting and go through a bunch of procedures to get it approved.

Protecting animals might sound glorious, but even if done well, it doesn't add a single cent to the nation's GDP. Professor Chu and his team often run on insufficient annual funds, so being able to provide 2000 yuan is already quite considerate.

Suming now couldn't be bothered with worrying about this small amount of money. He simply bought himself a small motorboat and moored it in the middle of Shuijun Lake, lounging in a deck chair to sunbathe while scattering his spiritual power into the water.

During this period, the fish in the lake had grown a size bigger. With the rate they were growing, they would be ready for sale in just a few months.

Lately, the gharial gar fish had become much better behaved. Without Suming's control, they would go to Huating Reservoir to feed on time each day and come back full, resting within the area Suming had designated for them quite obediently, saving Suming quite a bit of trouble.

The alligator snapping turtles and the bighead carp had nothing better to do; they did nothing but eat all day, quickly growing in size.

The alligator snapping turtles were somewhat better off, mainly putting on muscle and looking like muscular men. Paired with a fierce-looking shell, they looked quite majestic, and could probably scare quite a few people if they went out at night;

Bighead carp, however, was a lost cause, growing fat and clumsy with a tendency to mutate into a pig. At first glance, it resembled a plump, black dolphin.

The mother dolphin was undergoing treatment, and without her to keep them in check, the dolphin calves acted like two idling hooligans all day in Shuijun Lake, messing around. Sometimes when they saw tourists, they would even pop up to spit water, turn in a circle, and wiggle their butts, baiting for some snacks and screams from young girls.

When they saw Suming's boat approaching, the two dolphin calves started calling out joyfully from afar, leaping through the wind and over the water's surface, quickly reaching the side of the motorboat, where they stood upright on the water, twisting and turning.

Suming casually threw a bass from the bucket, and before the bass even fully hit the water, one of the dolphin calves waiting by the side of the boat leaped, its tail gliding over the surface as if it were sliding on the water, and snatched the fish in its mouth.

The other dolphin calf, having missed out, was so anxious that it kept calling out, paddling with its flippers while perched on the edge of the boat, its round head desperately pushing towards the direction of the bucket.

"You shameless thing…" Suming grabbed a squid and tossed it over; its tentacles spread out in the wind, splatting the face of the dolphin calf with a 'biu' sound.

The dolphin calf opened its huge mouth, leaned its body slightly backward, and then inhaled forcefully, slurping the entire squid into its belly, much like slurping noodles.

"Stop eating, go see your mom!"

"Go see your mom" had recently become a popular phrase in Yangchuan City. Ever since the TV report about the family of dolphins at the zoo, swarms of tourists were attracted every day, eager to personally see this animal even rarer than pandas. Later, some cheeky person wrote a comedic article online titled "I've Come to See Your Mom."

The article went viral overnight, and "go see your mom" became a popular phrase, meaning "see something rare."