Beachcombers in San Diego got the fright of their lives when they spotted a grotesque-looking sea creature washed ashore on Torrey Pines State Beach last Tuesday. The discovery made waves online after images and videos of the eerie flotsam surfaced.
Jay Beiler, who stumbled upon the creature, initially mistook it for a jellyfish, but upon closer inspection, he realized it was a fish. By then, a crowd had gathered to marvel at his find, which he described as “the stuff of nightmares.” His photos showed the creature with rows of undulating teeth and a fleshy tassel on its head, as though it were designed by Tim Burton.
The Scripps Institution of Oceanography later identified the creature as a Pacific Footballfish, one of the larger species of anglerfish that can reach a maximum length of 2 feet. This oceanic predator is notable for its fleshy, bioluminescent head protrusion that it uses to lure small prey, hence its “angler” namesake, according to the California Academy of Sciences.
The footballfish is a rarely-seen denizen of the depths, usually residing at depths of 2,000 to 3,300 feet. Beiler’s find marks the first sighting of this species in San Diego since 2001. The Pacific Footballfish is known from only 30 specimens that have ever been collected and brought to museums around the Pacific Ocean, according to Ben Frable, the collection manager of the marine vertebrate collection at Scripps.
While scientists are still unsure of what causes these creatures to wash up on shore, the Pacific Footballfish is famous for another reason: the male is a sexual parasite that fertilizes the female by fusing itself to her body and pumping her with sperm like a lecherous lamprey.
Beiler, still buzzing from the encounter, admitted that he had never seen anything quite as fearsome as this creature. Indeed, this isn’t the first time a rare fish has washed ashore. Oregon beachcombers discovered a colorful 100-pound Opah on the shore of the state’s northwestern region in July.
