August 13, 2026
Mike Coffey/Facebook
An 8-year-old boy from Folsom caught this piranha, pictured above.
It's normal to find catfish and carp in Ridley Park Lake. But last weekend, a Folsom boy hooked something stranger.
Eight-year-old Seamus Coffey caught a red-bellied piranha while on a Saturday fishing trip with his father Mike. The omnivorous fish, famed for its fearsome teeth, weighed 2 pounds and had distinctive reddish-orange coloring on its underside.
The Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission confirmed that Coffey's fish was indeed a piranha, normally found in the Amazon River and other parts of South America. It was likely an "unwanted pet," a PFBC rep said, that was dumped into the lake. Releasing exotic wildlife is illegal under state law.
According to Mike Coffey, he and his son were initially so stunned by the piranha that they merely observed it for several minutes. Eventually, they "humanely killed it" and threw it out to the part of the lake where snapping turtles reside.
For Seamus Coffey, who hopes to be a fisherman, that's one impressive catch of the day.
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