But at least the vast majority have the common decency to be upfront about the fact they can do us serious harm--claws, big teeth, bright colors. But not these guys. These assholes can ruin your day, and you'll never see them coming.

We at Cracked are no strangers to the horrors of the natural world. There are some just outright evil creatures out there.

7 The Candiru Fish

There are hundreds of organizations that are devoted to saving the Amazon. But, if Judge Joe Brown has taught us anything, it's that there are always two sides to an argument. So what could we possibly have against the rainforest? Well among other things, the Amazon is home to nightmarish creatures like the candiru, otherwise known as the vampire fish. The nickname appears to be a cruel joke, because quite frankly we'd rather get stuck in a damned city full of vampires rather than run into one these nightmares.

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Seriously, if you haven't heard of these things, and what they can do, just start cringing now. It's about to get ugly.

First, it's tiny. You won't see it if you're, for instance, standing waist-deep in water. Not until it's much, much too late.

You see, when the fish isn't around humans, it utilizes its extreme sense of smell and taste to track trace amounts of urea and ammonia that leak from the gills of other, less assholish fish. Then the candiru wedges itself into their gills, extending spines to latch onto their flesh and feed on the blood of the host. To quote from Wikipedia: "the Candiru begins to gnaw a hole towards a major blood vessel and gorges itself." But who cares about that? After all, you're not a fish, right?

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Hey, you know what else releases a stream of urea and ammonia? You, pissing yourself in fear of this unholy beast. Thus if you are unlucky enough to be in the Amazon River when you relieve yourself, you may fall victim to the candiru burrowing in a private region (we mean your dick). Yes, this happens. Now go back and read that part about the spines.



The candiru is represented here by a baby. The hot dog is your penis.

The fish is almost impossible to remove without surgery, though what difference does that make when the alternative would be expelling a spiny fish from your freshly ravaged nether regions?