With the forecast promising bright blue skies, uninterrupted sun, light breezes and temperatures over 15C, we took ourselves to the long beach at Littleferry for a walk, finding virtually nothing along the tide line except weed, mussel and other shells, a few sea potato tests, one bunch of skate eggs and....
....this strange creature - size 9 boot print for scale. At first we thought it might be the tail off a skate but it has....
....a small head to go on the long, otherwise featureless body; and there was obviously nothing there except the skeleton and the skin.
I had no idea what it could be - picture shows a clearer view of the skull - and some time on the internet hasn't helped much, except that, if it isn't an eel, it might be a hagfish.
Any suggestions gratefully received.
With the forecast promising bright blue skies, uninterrupted sun, light breezes and temperatures over 15C, we took ourselves to the long beach at Littleferry for a walk, finding virtually nothing along the tide line except weed, mussel and other shells, a few sea potato tests, one bunch of skate eggs and....
Following further research, I think it may be a sand eel. Having seen only small sand eels, in shoals on shallow beaches, I hadn't realised that they can grow to 30cm in length.
ReplyDeleteCould it be the Greater Pipe Fish? The gill covering looks distinctive with similarities to that of the seahorse family of which the Pipe Fish is a member.
ReplyDeleteI keep changing my mind on this one, Derryck - I think you're right as I magnified one of my photos and the front end looked very similar to the pipefish except the long mouth parts were missing. Thanks for sorting that one!
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