The victim of extensive fishing, a 10-foot Amazonian fish appears to be headed straight for extinction in several areas.

According to BBC News, the Arapaima, a formerly dominant fish in the Amazon River, is now extinct in eight of 41 communities observed in a study published in the journal Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems. The Arapaima is known to be one of the largest freshwater fish in the world.

Since they can grow up to 10 feet in length and 400 pounds, their size makes the fish both easy to harpoon and a sough-after prize for fishermen. They also approach the surface of the river in increments of five to 15 minutes.

"Bioeconomic thinking has predicted that scarcity would drive up fishing costs, which would increase price and help save depleted species," study lead author Leandro Castello, an assistant professor of fisheries in Virginia Tech's College of Natural Resources and Environment, said in a press release. "If that prediction were true, extinctions induced by fishing would not exist, but that is not what has happened.

"Fishers continue to harvest arapaima regardless of low population densities."

The new study refutes a commonly held theory that fishermen leave depleted areas, because the Arapaima are apparently disappearing from such heavily fished spots. Spanning 81 communities, the study authors spoke with 182 "experts" in fishing, according to colleagues.

"Mainstream thinking has predicted that scarcity would drive up price, which would increase fishing costs and help save depleted species. But that is not what has happened," Castello told BBC News. "Fishers continue to harvest arapaima regardless of population depletion. When the mature, large fish are gone, gill nets are used to harvest small fish and these capture juvenile arapaima as well. Eight communities report zero arapaima."

Any effort to preserve the endangered fish may be to implement Arapaima harvest rules, as 27 percent of the communities studied already do. The study authors found that communities that adhered to such rules had larger populations of Arapaima.

"Many fishing-induced extinctions in the tropics are going unnoticed because of lack of data, illegal fishing, and lack of economic alternatives for the fishers," Castello said. "The time has come to apply local ecological knowledge to help assess populations, document practices and trends, and solve problems through user participation in management and conservation.

"There is willingness among fishers to implement management, but our efforts require more support from governmental agencies."