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Kooky Creatures Keep Washing Up On Oregon Coast

Lancetfish's wild eye (photo Tiffany Boothe, Seaside Aquarium)

(Oregon Coast) – It's storm season, so it follows lots of flotsam and oddities will show up on Oregon's beaches. Then, follow a stretch of storms with a run of sunny weather and lots of beachcombers, and you have the recipe for a load of interesting finds.

It began about a week ago with a deceased baby whale and a dolphin never before seen on an Oregon beach making headlines, but an adorable baby seal and a few other critters have popped up as well.

Then this week, on the central coast, some real curiosities landed onshore, while in Cannon Beach a freaky fish made a stir recently.

Tiffany Boothe, with the Seaside Aquarium, responded Wednesday to a call that an odd fish washed up – still alive.

A resident of Cannon Beach was walking near Chapman Point that day and came across a strange fish he hadn’t seen before – still alive - and struggling in the surf.

Boothe said the fish isn’t rare, but rather a “cool fish.” Called a Pacific lancetfish, they usually reside in deeper waters but have been known to come in closer to shore.

Pacific Lancetfish found in Cannon Beach (photo Boothe)

“It looked as if this guy had gotten attacked by something,” Boothe said. “Though the photographs don't show it, there is a large gash in him exposing its internal organs. These are not particularly unusual fish, just cool. Their skin is a beautiful iridescent color accented with a light turquoise blue.”

There was nothing they could do for the barely-alive fish, Boothe said. Its corpse was left on the beach.

How it could’ve died is an odd thing, however. Sometimes, these fish will accidentally bite themselves while partaking in a feeding frenzy.

The lancetfish's large eyes enable them to see in deep water. These are scaleless fish with large teeth and sail-like dorsal fins. Boothe said they can be found worldwide and in almost all oceans, except for the polar oceans. They range in depths from 10 to over 3,000 feet.

“Lancetfish are mainly nocturnal,” Boothe said. “Their large teeth allow them to feed on such pry as crab, octopi, squid, and other fish. The Latin name, Alepisaurus ferox ,means scaleless lizard.”

Sea nettle jelly (photo Morse)

In Newport, beach expert Terry Morse walked the beaches of the area with great attention to detail and discovered a bundle of jellyfish and other oddities of interest. His findings took on a decidedly academic approach – with a touch of Dr. Frankenstein in the lab.

“There was lots of driftwood washed up, and many rocks have been exposed as the winter waves move sand from the beach to an offshore bar,” Morse wrote in his science blog on January 18. “I saw a few moon jellies (Aurelia labiata), a few sea nettle jellies (Chrysaora fuscescens), and a couple sea gooseberry comb jellies (Pleurobrachia bachei) stranded on the beach.”

Morse also reported seeing the tracks of a variety of creatures in the sand: small shorebirds, and a small and a larger beetle.

Cluster of eggs found by Terry Morse in Newport (photo Terry Morse)

“My most interesting find was the two-centimeter-wide (about three quarters of an inch) cluster of eggs,” Morse. “When I collected them in a small specimen jar and added sea water, a nearly transparent fish larva hatched out.”

Morse said two tiny black eyes could be seen at the head of the larva.

Like a kind of coastal mad scientist, Morse has kept them for this whole 10 days. No other eggs hatched. But the one larva did eventually begin swimming around in its observation tank.

“It was vigorously and rhythmically moving from the bottom to the top of the observation tank, apparently feeding at the water’s surface,” Morse said. “Watching it swim and looking closely at its mouthparts, it is clear that it is a crustacean, perhaps a shrimp, not a fish. I also don’t know whether the eggs and the shrimp are related. It is possible that the crustacean was just sheltering amongst the eggs when the cluster was washed ashore, and came out of hiding when I added seawater. The eggs may be from something else entirely.”

Moonjelly found in Newport (photo Morse)

It died after a few days, but in the meantime someone did indeed identify his little friends from the sea.

“Vicki Osis, a long-time marine educator at Hatfield Marine Science Center, identified the eggs as being from a lingcod, Ophiodon elongates,” Morse said. “Lingcods belong to the greenling family (Hexagrammidae), and can grow to 5 feet long and over 100 lbs. After spawning, males guard the eggs. They are a prized sport and commercial fish.”

They have been so exploited that limits have been put on the fish.

Morse went to examine the newborn shrimp-like creature under a microscope, and said it appeared to be flattened “side-to-side, which suggests that it might be an amphipod crustacean. Shrimps, crabs, and pill bugs are examples of crustaceans. Beach fleas and whale lice are kinds of amphipods you may have heard of or be familiar with.”

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