Washed up: sea creatures create international headlines
Poseidon has been reminding us who is boss this year, with a string of bizarre appearances by monsters of the deep.
February started off fairly normally, or at least as normal as a huge marlin sinking a boat can be.
A fisherman off Panama did battle with a huge black marlin and came off the loser.
The marlin sank the boat after the fisherman put it in reverse to chase the fish.
One commentator said that the captain fell as he was backing down on the fish, a common practice, at full throttle.
Thankfully the crew survived, along with the marlin who made a quick getaway.
Things got a bit weirder by the 28th of February, when a mystery ‘pig beast’ washed up on a South Wales beach.
The creature was spotted by a local Peter Bailey as he was walking his dog. He told the Western Telegraph: “I was taking my dog for her evening walk across the south beach when she started acting out of character by howling and running round in circles.
“I ran up to her to see if she was ok and then I came across this hideous looking carcass. I could see it had little hair left on its decomposing body.
“Immediately I thought it was a horse but it had claws like a bear and a body of a pig. Surprisingly it didn't smell.”
Experts said it may have been a dog affected by extended periods of time in the water, or possibly even a badger given that it has five toes.
There was a brief reprieve from the horrors of the deep, but by August 23rd a ‘horned’ sea creature had washed up in Villaricos, Spain.
Meanwhile, a marine science instructor snorkeling off the Southern California coast was stunned to discover the carcass of a 14-foot oarfish.
The five-metre, serpent-like creature washed ashore in October, and it has since been revealed that the fish was ready to become a mum.
The healthy female was ripe to spawn, according to marine biologist H.J. Walker of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.
The fish had 6-foot-long ovaries which contained hundreds of thousands of eggs that were nearly ready to be released, Walker said.
It's unclear why the creature died.
Fisherman catches 362kg sea monster
In November, a Florida fisherman who hooked a 362kg rare deep sea beast has described the mysterious fish as "a dinosaur".
Captain Mark Quartiano, who is more affectionately known as “Mark the Shark,” posted this photo to Instagram of his crew smiling next to the monster catch off Miami Beach.
“I’ve caught one like it before, but never that size, not in the last 30 years I’ve been doing this,” Quartiano told ABC News.
“It’s a very rare fish. It’s like a big gigantic whipping stingray. It’s a dinosaur.”
The monster species is actually a Dactylobatus clarkii, a deep sea species also known as a "hookskate" or "fingerskate".
Quartiano snagged the five-metre Dactylobatus, which is known to inhabit depths of over 300 metres, while he was filming a series of TV shows for a Japanese network.
He released the fish because he had no other use for it, he said.
“Stingrays are usually pretty good to eat, but this one as table fare? I don’t know how that would work out.”
