Scientists have confirmed that a dead sunfish, whose carcass was found in the Azores, is the heaviest bony fish on the planet.
Local residents of Faial Island, part of the Azores group (belonging to Portugal), discovered the carcass of a huge sunfish swimming in the ocean off the coast. It turned out that this is a representative of the species Mola alexandrini, and this fish weighs almost 3 tons. This figure is an all-time record for modern bony fish, he writes Live science.
On fire. The technology appeared to be its own Telegram channel. Sign up to not miss the latest and exciting news from the world of science!
The lifeless carcass of the sunfish was captured and sent for research by scientists. An autopsy and detailed study of the found bone fish was performed, and scientists recently presented their verdict.
According to marine biologist José Nuno Gomes-Pereira, it is a southern sunfish, 3.6 meters wide and 3.5 meters long. After weighing, it turned out that the weight of the fish is 2844 kg. During the study, the scientists examined the fish’s stomach contents and took samples of its DNA.
“In the photographs, this dead fish doesn’t look like it actually is, it’s really huge,” says Gomes-Pereira.
According to the scientist, now a new world record and the title of heaviest bony fish belongs to this specimen of marine fauna. The previous world record was also held by a sunfish caught in Japan in 1996. It weighed 2300 kg. The Mola alexandrini species was only classified by scientists in 2018. These giants can be found in different parts of the Earth, but their exact numbers remain unknown.
As already written Focusin Cambodia caught fishermen giant freshwater breed weighing almost 200 kg. Its width was 1.9 m, length – 4 m.
Also Focus wrote that it was close to Greenland A fish was found with antifreeze running through its veins.
We remind you that the island of death in New Zealand, surrounded by sharks, 4,000 whales died in 120 years.