Mike Covington, age 10, of Winston Salem, N.C., for his question:

WHAT IS A BARRACUDA?

Let's face it, the sea is a hungry place where most of the fishes greedily gobble up their neighbors. Some are fiercer than others and, naturally, the one called tiger of the¬ sea must be one of the fiercest. He is the giant barracuda, who sometimes attacks people. True, he may deserve his bad reputation, but his smaller cousins are less fierce and most of them are harmless, at least to people.

Some experts believe that the giant barracuda is as dangerous as the man eating sharks. In fact, a toothy underwater attack may be blamed on a shark when the real culprit is a barracuda. This is most likely to happen in the warm blue waters around the West Indies, where the giant barracuda is most at home.

    The fearsome fellow may reach a length of eight feet.

His mighty muscular body is shaped somewhat like a long torpedo.  His lower jaw sticks out in front and both jaws are filled with terrible teeth. Several of his fang type teeth are almost an inch long and when he closes his greedy jaws they fit together and slice like scissors.

This tiger of the sea is at home in warm tropical seas, where he usually preys on smaller fishes. He is always hungry, always hunting, and people who know him say he is both curious and cunning. Some say that he often herds a group of fishes into a corner and traps them there until he is ready for his next meal.

Sometimes he hunts in the mangrove swamps around the West Indies. There the fishermen live in fear of him. His eyes are sharp enough to see moving objects, even in murky water, and he uses sight rather than smell to do most of his hunting. Some experts suspect that human swimmers tempt his curiosity, which may lead to an attack. No wonder they call him the tiger of the  sea.

Aside from this ghastly giant, there are about 20 other members of the barracuda family. They range in length from 18 inches to four or five feet. All of them are toothy, torpedo¬ shape fishes  but only the giant of the family is a serious menace to man.

We know a lot about how, where and when the giant barracuda is likely to attack humans. But very little is known about his family life. Some experts suspect that the eggs are left to hatch in the open sea. Growing barracudas swim and hunt together  but the adults tend to be loners. There comes a time when all barracuda crimes are forgiven  when the small types are caught in healthy sea water they are said to be very good to eat.