Farewell spit wash up

OB

OB

Colossal Squid
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ob said:
I don't think this was posted earlier, a picture of the 23 Aug '04 kiwi Archi, for your perusal :smile:

http://www.farewellspit.co.nz/netmaestro/gallery.aspx?ImageID=11&AlbumID=7

Anyone want to attempt at the "globster"? All you crypto's out there, come on! Join me :biggrin2:

http://www.farewellspit.co.nz/netmaestro/gallery.aspx?ImageID=19&AlbumID=7

(I know, it's all blubber and fibres, but there is a distict tentacleness to this one)
Click to expand...

I thought the latter "globster" was shown by DNA to be some sort of whale part, although I may be getting it mixed up with another one.

That's a great archi specimen, though. It looks as if some of its arms are longer than the others-- that's just that there are parts missing, right? At least, I thought archi's arms were all pretty much the same size... Could it have lost some arms and been growing them back?
 
That particular specimen is now in Germany with Gunther von Hagens. There's a thread here somewhere that discusses it .... but that was quite a while ago.
 
I sort of assumed most of the sea serpents, particularly the "maned" sea serpents, could now be explained as oarfish, even if they writhe side-to-side, instead of up-and-down in the traditional undulating patterns associated with, say, the Gloucester Sea Serpent.

I saw some footage a couple years ago of a bunch of people wrestling a netted oarfish in a rocky cove. Iridescent silver with a bright red mane, and ridiculously long - well over twenty feet. Probably, based on the video footage, more like thirty-five. It thrashed and put up a goodly fight, too. Poor blighter, but good fighter.

I would have rather seen footage of it at depth in the wild, perfectly healthy, than dying inshore like that, but man, it was very impressive. I'm sure some of you saw this footage as well. Anybody else ever seen good footage of a healthy specimen of good size in the wild? I'd love to construct a Chinese-parade-dragon version of an oarfish and could use access to such visual documentation.
 
erich orser said:
I'd love to construct a Chinese-parade-dragon version of an oarfish and could use access to such visual documentation.
Click to expand...

I can't help with the oarfish itself, but Andrea and I did a few dragon dances in Chinese New Year's parades with our Tai Chi/ Kung Fu class, so if you construct the beast, we could help it move...
 
Wow. That's amazing. You're on! Not this show, but the next, definitely. And I want to make a parade squid for Tonmocon II, so I'm conscripting you for that!
 
I grew up in Arkansas and we had a local monster ( the white river monster) explained as a missplaced seal. forget about the fact that alligator gar are common in the area and I have personally seen a 12 foot specimen mounted in a deer camp. let alone bull sharks, alligators, and the occasional large sturgeon, all of which if not common occur in the area.
 
erich orser said:
Wow. That's amazing. You're on! Not this show, but the next, definitely. And I want to make a parade squid for Tonmocon II, so I'm conscripting you for that!
Click to expand...

Er, I'm not sure that dragon-dance movements will work for a squid like it might for an oarfish, but I'll be happy to give it a shot...
 
Oarfish in its natural habitat

erich orser said:
I sort of assumed most of the sea serpents, particularly the "maned" sea serpents, could now be explained as oarfish.

I saw some footage a couple years ago of a bunch of people wrestling a netted oarfish in a rocky cove. Iridescent silver with a bright red mane, and ridiculously long - well over twenty feet. Probably, based on the video footage, more like thirty-five. It thrashed and put up a goodly fight, too. Poor blighter, but good fighter.

I would have rather seen footage of it at depth in the wild, perfectly healthy, than dying inshore like that, but man, it was very impressive.
Click to expand...

Here's some of the few pictures ever taken of an oarfish in its natural environment. It appears that their preferred (feeding?) position is "hanging" vertically, although they're sometimes also found at the surface, swimming "tipped over", like flatfish; the latter might actually account for apparently vertical undulations...

For futher live action, check http://www.divernet.com/biolog/0805oarfish.shtml

And for an underwater video, proving mostly how effective reflective camouflage can be: http://www.thejump.net/multimedia/OutdoorVideos.html

PS: The picture to the left is a dead stranded specimen, found in Oz, Feb '05
 

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we were just in florida (sarasota, west coast) and we found what I believe to be an immature oarfish, stranded on the beach. it was long (4 inches), thin, and translucent. we have a short video of it swimming around in a large clam shell, if anyone is interested.
 
"Oh goody, any chance of that being sent to Tony, to be posted in the "off topic" supporter's forum? Fully credited, of course?"

um...mabye. I'm not a supporter yet, that may or may not be a problem.

as for the pictures, yeah, it kinda looked like that, but smaller, and with less frilly bits. we threw it back in the ocean after a brief attempt on my part to convince my parents that raising an oarfish would be feasable...
oh well.
 

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