Joe Exclamation
The seven seas hold some of the world’s strangest creatures in their dark depths.
Every now and then some of that maritime madness gets caught by fishermen, so we bring you 10 of the strangest things ever caught!
1 Cyclops Shark
These unbelievable photos in 2011 had the entire internet screaming FAKE! Some fishermen in Baja California had stumbled across a baby albino bull-shark, which was also a cyclops!? It was later proven to be 100% real. When fishermen cut open a pregnant bull-shark it was among the unborn fetuses. It is thought that the albino shark had holoprosencephaly, a condition with only 50 recorded cases, where the face’s symmetry is merged, turning the animal into a cyclops.
2. Weird Jellyfish
This mysterious sea creature was captured by Sabas de la Rosa Camacho of the Civil Protection and Fire Acapulco team, washed up on Acapulco beach. What the mysterious creature actually was, still remains a mystery. Theories include a half-digested whale’s lunch, or a beached stygiomedusa gigantea jellyfish.
3. Lobster Chimera
Alan Robinson had a shock when he found this 1 in 50 million discovery. When lifting one of his traps in Dyer’s Bay, Maine, he found this two toned chimera, looking as if half of its body had been in boiling water. Alan donated the lobster to the Mount Desert Oceanarium who explained that lobsters have a growth pattern in which the two halves of their shells develop separately, made up of the combination of three colors. This rare specimen was lacking two of those colors on one half of its body.
4. Pyrosome
These creepy worm-shaped things are often caught on camera by divers and seem like something from another planet! However they are really tubes of hundreds of tiny creatures called “zooids”. They actually work together as a filter to collect plankton. They also glow in the dark and you can see them underwater for 100 meters! They can also reach up to 30 meters in length.
5. Married Sailfish
Three friends were fishing off the coast of Fort Lauderdale in 2002 in an effort to take Eric Bartos’ mind off his shaky marriage. After several beers, and having snagged a magnificent Sailfish, he put his wedding ring on its bill, took a photo, and watched it sail away in a feat of perfect symbolism. Three years later, the friends were fishing in the same area, Eric amazingly reeled-in the very same sailfish with his ring still attached. After passing a lie detector test Eric stated; “It’s a compliment that some people don’t believe us. It just shows us how miraculous this story is.”
6. Human Skull
The year was 2007 when local fisherman Barry Hunter emptied the trawler net releasing thousands of thrashing fish. Among them; a human skull. The chances of fishing human remains out of the ocean are slim. But the chances of actually reuniting with a deceased drinking buddy, are slimmer still. When Barry turned over his disturbing discovery, it was discovered that it belonged to Brian Allison an old acquaintance whose ship had sunk in a North Sea storm three years earlier.
7. Opah Fish
These bizarre fish look just like someone has blown-up an aquarium fish in photoshop. But Opah fish are indeed very real. Joe Ludlow and two friends were fishing off the coast of central California, when all three managed to reel-in a “Moonfish”. It is thought that the warmer waters brought by El Niño also attracted these rare tropical specimens.
8. Great White Shark
Frank Mundus and Don Braddick were fishing off the coast of New York, when they saw a group of sharks feasting on a dead whale. They got closer and tried their luck at fishing one of the sharks. Between them they managed to reel one in, weighing a whopping 3427lbs. The biggest fish ever to be caught with a rod.
9. Mantis Shrimp
Steve Bargeron was night fishing off a dock in Florida when he snagged this huge 18 inch shrimp. He threw it back, but not before snagging a pic which he posted to facebook. It was later identified as a mantis shrimp, one of the weirdest and fastest types of shrimp. It’s front pincers can move as fast as a gunshot from a twenty-two caliber rifle and its legs move so fast that they instantly boil the surrounding water.
10. Colossal Squid
In 2013, Capt. John Bennett and his crew managed to haul aboard this enormous creature from a mile below the surface. The Kraken-like sea monster is one of the sea’s most elusive species, weighing 770 pounds and was as long as a minibus, making it the largest squid ever caught.
Which one of these catches surprised you the most?
Comment below!