Petrel Cove, SA: Mystery sea creature washes up along popular beach
A mysterious creature has washed up on a popular beach, sparking divided reactions among shocked residents and visitors.
Beachgoers initially thought it was a large rock when they first spotted the 2.7-metre-wide sea monster at Petrel Cove near Encounter Bay along South Australia’s southern coast last weekend.
Stunned locals shared photos and videos of the carcass on social media.
While some were excited about the “amazing” discovery, others called it “sad to see.”
The South Australia Museum has since confirmed that the creature is ‘almost certainly a bumphead sunfish’.
The dead sunfish, partially buried in the sand, has brought a steady stream of visitors to the beach despite its strong odor.
At 2.7 meters wide, some people at first thought the giant sunfish was a large rock
Local Dani Brown thought the giant sunfish was ‘pretty cool’ and posed next to it to show off the scale and size of the creature
It has since gone viral online as well.
‘Wow! The dead sunfish, partially buried in the sand, has brought a steady stream of visitors to the beach despite its strong odor. observation,” one viewer commented.
Another added: ‘Amazing. I wonder how productive they are?’
A third wrote: ‘Beautiful friendly creatures.’
Local resident Dani Brown heard about the fish and wanted to see it for herself.
“It was pretty cool to see, this is the first time I’ve seen one,” she said Yahoo.
Although sunfish can grow up to 4 meters wide, this 2.7 meter long specimen was still enormous when Mrs Brown lay next to it.
A spokesperson for the South Australia Museum said this Yahoo that although angelfish are found worldwide, the washed-up giant species is the most common species seen in South Australia.
‘You can tell it is a bumphead sunfish and not one of the other two species (Mola tecta, the sunfish and Mola mola, the sunfish) because of the prominent chin you can see in the photo. The other two species don’t have that,” she said.
Although it is not known how the sunfish died, Danish marine biologist Dr. Marianne Nyegaard previously told Yahoo that it may be impossible to say what kills them. She even believes that stranded angelfish sometimes “fall onto land” like humans “fall into the ocean.”
“Beached angelfish appear to have been generally healthy, with no apparent cause of death or impairment that could explain why they ended up on the beach,” she says.
The giant sunfish, partially embedded in the sand, has been attracting a steady stream of visitors since Sunday despite its scent
It’s not the first time a sunfish, which normally lives in the depths of the ocean, has washed up along the coast of South Australia.
It is believed that in 2019 a Mola mola species was found near the mouth of the Murray River.
South Australia Museum fish collection manager Ralph Foster said ABC news Back then, the gigantic animals liked to come to the surface and bask in the sun – that’s how they got their name.
Mr Foster said the creatures rise to the surface and lie on their sides and, once warm enough, return to a depth of several hundred meters and ‘feed on jellyfish and stay down there’.