Ugliest/ most unusual fish or creature

[ledhead36]

Let's see 'em.

[ledhead36]

deepwater

[ledhead36]

seaslug

[ledhead36]

?

[ledhead36]

goofy :D

[ledhead36]

mantis

[ledhead36]

chimera

[ledhead36]

skate

[ledhead36]

eel

[ledhead36]

stingray worlds largest

[ledhead36]

stingray

[ledhead36]

whale shark

[ledhead36]

lunch :D

[ledhead36]

hungry

[captnemo]

Let's see 'em.

That's one ugly creature.

[stripercrazy]

snakehead

[stripercrazy]

2

[stripercrazy]

3

[plugcrazy]

fang

[hookedonbass]

prehistoric

[hookedonbass]

careful!

[hookedonbass]

anglerfish

[hookedonbass]

what

[hookedonbass]

ocean sunfish

[hookedonbass]

chupacabra

[hookedonbass]

wolf

[hookedonbass]

great white

[hookedonbass]

freaky

[hookedonbass]

stonefish

[hookedonbass]

squid

[hookedonbass]

sharks

[hookedonbass]

toad

[hookedonbass]

lionfish

[hookedonbass]

mola mola

[hookedonbass]

misc

[hookedonbass]

jump

[hookedonbass]

goblin

[hookedonbass]

frilled shark

[hookedonbass]

toothy :scared:

[hookedonbass]

colecanth

[baitstealer]

http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=2775&stc=1&thumb=1&d=1220072729 (http://stripersandanglers.com/Forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=2775&d=1220072729)

I like the above one that you posted hooked on bass. Fantastic pic!

[DarkSkies]

Send in by Rip-plugger, thanks!


MONSTER FISH PHOTOS: "Evolution on Steroids" in Congo


[/URL]
(http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/02/photogalleries/monster-fish-congo-missions/photo2.html)



http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/02/photogalleries/monster-fish-congo-missions/images/primary/090213-01-monster-fish-congo-missions_big.jpg





February 13, 2009--Goliath tiger fish, such as the one seen above, are among the uniquely adapted "monster fish" of the Congo River, which winds through several African countries.

A recent, unprecedented river run on the Congo yielded a raft of new discoveries, including different species--some potentially new--in nearly every nook and cranny, scientists announced this week.

The river was also found to be possibly the world's deepest, and its extraordinary changes in depths and currents help explain why it's such a hotbed of fish diversity.


"What we're seeing here is kind of evolution on steroids," said team leader Melanie Stiassny, a fish biologist at the American Museum of Natural History. Stiassny, a member of the National Geographic Society's [URL="http://www.nationalgeographic.com/field/grants-programs/conservation-trust.html"]Conservation Trust (http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/02/photogalleries/monster-fish-congo-missions/photo4.html), was among the marine and evolutionary biologists, hydrologists, and kayakers who conducted the exhaustive research in summer 2008. (The National Geographic Society owns National Geographic News.)

[bababooey]

The goliath tiger fish is the one fish that would make me scream like a little girl if I was swimming and it came near me.
The biggest scourge of this decade would have to be the lionfish. Stories turning up everywhere. Worse than the killer bees.

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2013/07/lionfish_invasion_the_invasive_fish_are_eating_so_ many_native_species_that.html
HOME (http://www.slate.com/) / Science (http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science.html) : The state of the universe.

The Worst Marine Invasion Ever

I could not believe what I found inside a lionfish.

By Christie Wilcox (http://www.slate.com/authors.christie_wilcox.html)|Posted Monday, July 1, 2013, at 7:00 AM

"Do you know what this is?" James Morris (http://oceanservice.noaa.gov/profiles/oct11/morris.html) looks at me, eyes twinkling, as he points to the guts of a dissected lionfish in his lab at the National Ocean Service’s Center for Coastal Fisheries and Habitat Research in Beaufort, N.C. I see some white chunky stuff. As a Ph.D. candidate at the Hawaii Institute of Marine Biology, I should know basic fish biology literally inside and out. When I cut open a fish, I can tell you which gross-smelling gooey thing is the liver, which is the stomach, etc.

He's testing me, I think to myself. Morris is National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's pre-eminent scientist studying the invasion of lionfish into U.S. coastal waters. He’s the lionfish guy, and we met in person for the first time just a few days earlier. We're processing lionfish speared by local divers, taking basic measurements, and removing their stomachs for ongoing diet analyses. Not wanting to look bad, I rack my brain for an answer to his question. It's not gonads. Not spleen. I’m frustrated with myself, but I simply can't place the junk; I've never seen it before. Finally, I give up and admit that I'm completely clueless.

"It's interstitial fat."

"Fat?"

"Fat," he says firmly. I look again. The white waxy substance hangs in globs from the stomach and intestines. It clings to most of the internal organs. Heck, there's got to be at least as much fat as anything else in this lionfish's gut. That's when I realize why he's pointing this out.

"Wait ... these lionfish are overweight?" I ask, incredulous.

"No, not overweight," he says. "Obese." The fish we're examining is so obese, he notes, that there are even signs of liver damage.

Obese. As if the lionfish problem in North Carolina wasn't bad enough.

Though comparing invasions is a lot like debating if hurricanes are more devastating than earthquakes, it’s pretty safe to say that lionfish in the Atlantic (http://www.ccfhr.noaa.gov/stressors/lionfish.aspx) is the worst marine invasion to date—not just in the United States, but globally. Lionfish also win the gold medal for speed, spreading faster than any other invasive species. While there were scattered sightings from the mid-1980s, the first confirmation that lionfish were becoming established (http://www.int-res.com/abstracts/meps/v235/p289-297/) in the Atlantic Ocean occurred off of North Carolina in 2000. Since then, they have spread like locusts, eating their way throughout the Caribbean and along every coastline from North Carolina to Venezuela, including deep into the Gulf of Mexico. When lionfish arrive on a reef, they reduce native fish populations by nearly 70 percent (http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0032596). And it’s no wonder—the invasive populations are eight or more times as dense than those in their native range, with more than 450 lionfish per hectare reported in some places (http://aquaticcommons.org/2847/1/NCCOS_TM_99.pdf). That is a lot of lionfish.

These alien fish didn’t just come here on their own. Early guesses as to how the lionfish arrived ranged from ships’ ballast water to the coastal damage caused by Hurricane Andrew (http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2010/04/mystery-of-the-lionfish-dont-bla.html), but now scientists are fairly sure that no ships or natural disasters are to blame. Instead, it’s our fault. Pretty, frilly fins made the fish a favored pet and lured aquarists and aquarium dealers into a false sense of security. We simply didn’t see how dangerous these charismatic fish were—dangerous not for their venom, but for their beauty. We have trouble killing beautiful things, so instead we choose to release them into the wild (http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/science-sushi/2013/03/22/new-girl-fishes-for-laughs-catches-terrible-episode/#.Ubt_VGSduic), believing somehow that this is a better option when, in actuality, it’s the worst thing we can do. Released animals rarely survive in the harsh real world, but it’s even worse when they do. Pet releases and escapees have become problematic invaders all over the country, from the ravenous pythons in Florida to the feral cats of Hawaii. In the case of lionfish, multiple releases from different owners likely led to enough individuals to start an Atlantic breeding population. Rough genetic estimates suggest that fewer than a dozen female fish began what may go down in history as the worst marine invasion of all time.

17268


In North Carolina, the lionfish invasion can be seen at its worst. Offshore, where warm waters from the Gulf Stream sweep up the coast, the lionfish reign. Local densities increased 700 percent between 2004 and 2008. I got to witness the unfathomable number of lionfish firsthand when I dove with the crew of Discovery Diving, a local scuba shop, to compete in North Carolina’s inaugural lionfish derby (http://discoverydiving.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=408&Itemid=173). I’ve never seen so many lionfish in my life. I didn’t get more than 20 yards from my starting point before I saw hundreds—literally, hundreds. My spear couldn’t fly fast enough to catch them all. On the last day of the tournament, a six-diver team bagged 167 lionfish from one site in two dives, and they didn’t even make a dent in the population on that wreck site. Morris estimates that more than 1,000 lionfish are at this site. Let me tell you, this is what an invasion looks like. An ecological cascade has been set in motion by these Indo-Pacific fish, and scientists are frantically gathering data, learning as much as they can to understand the extent of the damage lionfish will inflict, and figuring out the best responses to protect these fragile marine ecosystems.

[Pebbles]

This one's for you Honey!!! Here she is at her best!!

http://ts3.explicit.bing.net/th?id=H.4861113787089718&pid=15.1

[buckethead]

Never know what you might find in a Tennessee river.

Strange fish with teeth caught in Tennessee River








1 hr 54 mins ago 2:36 Odd News Videos



Chris Brasher of Huntsville, Alabama was out fishing at Ditto Landing on the Tennessee River and pulled in an odd looking fish. As reported by WAFF 48 News, Brasher said he hasn’t seen another sea creature like it in his 20 years of fishing the Tennessee River. The experienced angler said, “You normally hold a fish by it’s mouth. I went to put my finger in my mouth, it had some teeth in there. So I was like, ‘What is this?’ You know, and I’ve just been trying to figure out what it is ever since.” Others are also perplexed. "Most people I've talked to, I’ve got, you know, peacock bass, I've gotten black crappie, and then just a few different ones. I got to looking it up online and a couple other people did. They were leaning towards the Oscar fish," said Brasher. WAFF consulted experts said they’d need to see the fish in person to confirm but agreed that it was probably an Oscar fish, and ruled out a piranha or pacu. If the fish is an Oscar, the popular South American aquarium fish, experts said it could live at Ditto Landing only during the summer, as the winter temperatures would be too cold for its survival.

While this toothy fish story seems unique, there have been several other sea creatures with chompers reeled in by fishermen. Doug Cutler speared a nightmare inducing sea lamprey in New Jersey’s Raritan River. An Irish tourist caught a sheepshead fish with pearly whites while vacationing in Terra Ceia Bay, Florida. Scott Curry was fishing on Buffalo Springs Lake in Texas when he pulled in what is believed to be a 20-pound pacu with human like teeth. As for Brasher, he will continue to fish at Ditto Landing, but commented, “I won’t be swimming in here anytime soon. You know, I see kids swimming in here and I wouldn’t recommend it after that. You never know what you might catch out here you know.”
http://news.yahoo.com/video/strange-fish-teeth-caught-tennessee-221619355.html

[bababooey]

striped frogfish/striped anglerfish
http://www.grindtv.com/wildlife/bizarre-two-legged-fish-whose-bite-is-as-fast-as-a-speeding-bullet-found-in-nz/#jFj3IM3ukZYwS4Cz.97

[voyager35]

http://www.theherald.com.au/story/3730605/camera-angle-behind-mystery-eel-of-swansea/
Read this the other day. The infamous Swansea pike eel in Australia.