The discovery comes just a week after a Pacific football fish – a deep-sea fisherman much rarer than the knifefish – drifted about three miles away on the Black Beach.
The fish, cataloged as SIO 21-37, is the latest addition to SIO’s Vertebrate Collection. Manager Ben Fable told CNN that the fish found in La Jolla Shores was alive but not once on land. It was “bombarded by seagulls”, according to Fable. However, SIO 21-37 will be preserved maybe hundreds of years.
Fable suspects that the fish may have washed up on the beach for a number of reasons including running from predators or getting caught in the current and not being strong enough to swim out.
But Fable insists cannibalism is not as taboo in the fish world as it is widely believed.
“So they have a pretty varied diet, but the other spearfish seem to be quite common. But what’s really interesting is that the other spearfish don’t really appear in the fish,” he said. their diet until the fish is about 3 feet long.
Little is known about the scythes and their distinctive behavior, says Fable, because they are not easily observed at lower depths, although they are found in all the world’s oceans. The lab took tissue samples that can be used for genetic identification and other data.
“From a research standpoint, finfish help provide a window into the open ocean food web,” says Frable. “So being able to learn more about how nitrogen and carbon move in the open ocean and what that could mean for interactions on a global scale is hugely important.”
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