Giant sunfish washes up on Oregon beach

TPO - Beachgoers were amazed to see a giant 2m long fish with a round body, large fins and bulging eyes washed up on the Oregon coast. This is a rare giant hood sunfish that washed up on Gearhart Beach in Oregon and may be the largest species ever sampled.

The carcass of a Hoodwinker fish found on Gearhart Beach. (Photo: Tiffany Boothe/Seaside Aquarium)

An expert has identified the giant fish as a Hoodwinker sunfish (Mola tecta), one of the world's largest bony fish and rarely seen in the Northern Hemisphere.

Seaside Aquarium received reports of the large fish found on the beach in Gearhart, a small town about 80 miles northwest of Portland. The individual may be the largest of its kind ever sampled, according to a study.

After news of the giant fish broke, Marianne Nyegaard, a New Zealand marine biologist involved in the discovery of M. tecta, contacted the Seaside Aquarium and identified it as a rare hoodoo sunfish.

Representatives from the Seaside Aquarium confirmed this after collecting photos, measurements and tissue samples of the fish. The washed-up specimen measured 2.2 meters in length and may be the largest ever sampled.

The hoodwinker sunfish is one of three species of sunfish in the genus Mola. The other two are the ocean sunfish (Mola mola), the most numerous of the three, and the humphead sunfish (Mola alexandrini). All three species can grow to about 11 feet (3.3 m) in length and weigh up to 5,000 pounds (2.3 tons), according to the American Museum of Natural History.

Sunfish forage at depths of 200 to 600 m, where they feed on jellyfish, small fish and crustaceans. While hunting, temperatures can drop below 10 degrees Celsius. According to a 2015 study, they are occasionally seen basking near the surface to regulate their body temperature after diving to hunt.

Ocean sunfish and hoodwinker sunfish are common worldwide in temperate and tropical oceans, but the hoodwinker sunfish was once thought to live only in the Southern Hemisphere, according to Oceansunfish.org, and is found primarily in Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa.

Ha Thu

According to Live Science

Source: https://tienphong.vn/ca-thai-duong-khong-lo-dat-vao-bai-bien-oregon-post1647761.tpo