Several social media users reacted in horror, while few were able to identify the fish.
Instagram has been creating a lot of buzz on the social media platform after a fisherman posted a picture of his caught fish, titled “Frankenstein’s fish”. The account rfedortsov_official_account has about 650,000 followers on Instagram and regularly posts interesting fish that he manages to catch while at work.
The photo, which went viral last week, shows a translucent white fish with sunken green eyes, a tail that is jagged and what look like tattered fins. There are also strange markings on the fish, which make it appear that its body has been sewn.
Several social media users reacted in horror, while few were able to identify the fish. User jmcg21 wrote, “My marine bio son said it probably looks like ratfish from the depths of the skin. They are cartilaginous – not scale (similar to sharks)”. According to the UK-based organization Shark Trust, such fish live in the depths of the ocean and are found at depths of 650 to 8,530 feet. They usually do not have much color and are adapted to withstand a lot of pressure due to their very dark habitat.
The account posted another fish from the deep, captioning the post, “I hope you’re not eating this time”. A dark fish is seen in the picture, with its eyes bulging out, as well as guts in its mouth.
Once again social media was quick to explain the picture, with user ribmagra, “Given the poor creature’s bulging eyes and internal organs hanging from its mouth, it suffered barotrauma, or ’bouting’, As divers call it. When deep-sea fish are pulled across a line or net, their swim bladder expands rapidly as the water pressure is rapidly reduced, and this forces their stomachs through their mouths and into forces their eyes to stick out of their heads. This way the fish often survives when they reach the surface.”
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