A museum displayed the “alien of the deep” sea creature’s squishy nose, nail-like teeth, and flabby pink body on Tuesday after it was discovered off the coast of Australia.
A museum received an unique marine creature off the coast of Australia that has been dubbed a “alien of the deep” and displayed its mushy nose, nail-like teeth, and flabby pink body on Tuesday.
Rare ‘deep alien’ goblin shark found
The prehistoric-looking goblin sharks live on deep sea bottoms and little is known about their lives.
“It’s pretty impressive, it’s not hideous it’s beautiful,” said the Αustralian Museum’s fish collection manager Mark McGrouther, who described its teeth as looking like “little daggers”.
Prehistoric-looking goblin sharks live in the deep sea and little is known about their lives
“They are not caught terribly often. They are not encountered terribly often at all.”
It showed off its fleshy snout, nail-like teeth, and soft pink body
McGrouther said this was only the fourth goblin shark to be acquired by the museum in Sydney, with the first two collected in the 1980s.
The latest was picked up by a fisherman in January. It was found near Eden, off Αustralia’s southeast coast, at a depth of about 200 metres (656 feet) and delivered to a local aquarium which kept it in excellent condition for the museum.
A rare sea creature described as a “deep-bottom alien”
McGrouther said he was “thrilled” to handle the shark, which is found in the Pacific, Αtlantic and Indian oceans. The species, whose scientific name is “Mitsukurina owstoni”, is thought to be a living fossil dating back some 125 million years.
Source: kenhthoisu.net
