Here There Be Monsters...

Unidentified Sea Creature Found After Typhoon

from Today Morning Express

Early on the morning of July 23, a fisherman from Ningbo City in east China's Zhejiang Province was shocked by the sight of a huge creature lying dead beside the seawall near his home.

Liu, who lives in Yangshashan of Chunxiao Town in Beilun District and who has been a fisherman for over ten years, said “I have never seen such a monster; it was larger than a whale."

It was first seen by villagers on July 20, according to Mei who breeds fish nearby, and is nearly 12 meters long and weighs around 2 tons, according to district sea and fishery bureau staff.

The animal reportedly has a long thin head and a snout nearly one meter long.

Partly rotten, with its spine exposed, it has been impossible to identify, but has been described as having some hair, and orange stripes across a three to four-meter wide belly. The skull, which alone weighs over 100 kg, and coccyx of the creature have fallen from its body.

Mei said four young people took away a 100 kg piece of the corpse to study and many experts have come to inspect it, but all in vain.

From the degree of putrefaction, the animal may have been dead for a week and beached by Typhoon Haitang several days ago, said Hu from Beilun’s sea and fishery bureau.

He said its overall structure means it’s unlikely to be a fish, but the shape of its head is like a crocodile’s.

Many experts said that, being seriously rotten and deprived of lower limbs and tail, the monster is unlikely to be identified or to be made into a specimen.


Researchers To Launch Exploration for "Lake Monsters" in Northwest China

from AFP

BEIJING - Chinese researchers will reportedly launch an investigation next month to study "lake monsters" in northwest China's Xinjiang region.

For hundreds of years, there have been rumors that mysterious creatures that devour livestock live at Kanasi lake, China's deepest alpine lake, located in Xinjiang, at the region bordering Mongolia, Kazakhstan and Russia.

Horses, cattle, and sheep are said to go missing near the lake every year, the Xinhua news agency said Friday.

In 1985, teachers and students from Xinjiang University's biology department launched the first search for the creatures and discovered that dozens of huge red fish, each 33 to 49 feet long and weighing more than four tons lived in the lake, according to Xinhua.

Scientists concluded after a two-year-long investigation in 1989 that the fish, a species of Taimen - a mighty salmonid that grows to monstrous proportions - were the "monsters."

In August last year, a team of Chinese scientists went to the site for an exploration.

But researchers still do not know how many Taimen are living in the lake or how long they have been there, how big the largest one is and whether the livestock that have gone missing for centuries were really devoured by the fish.

Next month, another team comprised of ecological experts and volunteers, will observe the lake from August 12 to try to find answers.

In recent years, the lake monster legend has drawn an increasing number of visitors and explorers to the lake, raising concerns about the effects on the ecological situation there.

The expedition also aims to raise public awareness about the area's ecological problems.