Why can’t saltwater fish live in freshwater, and freshwater fish can’t live in saltwater?
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Their bodies are not able to work in the water type they weren’t raised for. Specifically, there’s a process called osmosis that causes water to move across a barrier (like the cell membrane) in the direction of more stuff (salts, proteins, things that want to dissolve in water). So in freshwater fish, their cells have special systems to keep the water from flooding into their cells (without them, the cells would pop like a balloon). Saltwater fish have systems that help them deal with the incredible amount of salt they live in, and the constant pull of that salty environment on the water inside their cells (without them they’d shrivel up like a raisin).
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