Huge, Strange New Fish Washed Up On A California Beach
Huge, Strange New Fish Washed Up On A California Beach
This is the extraordinary tale of how a massive, strange-looking fish wound up on a beach on the other side of the world from where it lives.
The seven-foot fish washed up at UC Santa Barbara’s Coal Oil Point Reserve in Southern California last week. Researchers first thought it was a similar and more common species of sunfish — until someone posted photos on a nature site and experts weighed in.
What transpired after that surprised researchers from California to Australia and New Zealand.
It turned out to be a species never seen before in North America. It’s called the hoodwinker sunfish.
“When the clear pictures came through, I thought there was no doubt. This is totally a hoodwinker,” said Marianne Nyegaard, a marine sc...