A rare and spectacular event drew attention to the northern coast of Oregon: an enormous fish, usually observed in the temperate waters of the southern hemisphere, washed ashore, sparking curiosity among onlookers.
This image provided by Seaside Aquarium shows a hoodwinker sunfish stranded on June 3, 2024, on a beach in Gearhart, Oregon.
Credit: Tiffany Boothe/Seaside Aquarium
The hoodwinker sunfish, measuring 7.2 feet (2.2 meters) long, was discovered on Gearhart Beach. Remaining on the sand for several days, this impressive specimen might stay there for weeks, its tough skin making scavengers' work difficult.
Photos from the aquarium show a flat, round, gray fish lying on its side. A person kneeling nearby and a truck in the vicinity provide a better sense of the scale of this giant.
This phenomenon quickly ignited social media, prompting a New Zealand researcher specializing in sunfish to contact the aquarium. Marianne Nyegaard confirmed that it was indeed a hoodwinker sunfish, a rarer species than the common sunfish. She estimates that this specimen could be the largest ever observed.
This image provided by Seaside Aquarium shows a hoodwinker sunfish stranded on June 3, 2024, on a beach in Gearhart, Oregon.
Credit: Tiffany Boothe/Seaside Aquarium In 2017, Nyegaard revealed through genetic analyses and observations that the hoodwinker sunfish, or
Mola tecta, constitutes a distinct species from the common sunfish,
Mola mola. "Tecta," meaning "hidden" in Latin, refers to a species that long went unnoticed, explained the aquarium.
In 2019, a hoodwinker sunfish had already stranded on the California coast. Recently, others have been found in California and Alaska, challenging the theory that this species only lives in the southern hemisphere. It is also likely that these fish have stranded in other places in the Pacific Northwest but were mistaken for the common sunfish.