"It looked like the silvery blade of a knife. Peering through his goggles, diver Ted Judah had laid eyes on a deep-sea creature rarely encountered by humans. He and wife Linda were diving off McAbee Beach in Monterey County in late December when, near the surface, he spotted the undulating thing. It was some kind of ribbon fish, he wrote in a post on the Facebook group Monterey County Dive Reports. Kevin Lewand solved the mystery."
"I wanted to stay with it, but I felt like I was harassing it, Judah wrote of his encounter. He posted snapshots of the tiny creature. It had this keen ability to orient itself so that its narrowest profile was always facing me. The king-of-the-salmon got its name from the Makah, Indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest coast who believed the species led salmon back to their spawning grounds, according to the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute."
"Bruce Robison, a senior scientist at MBARI, said this was a rare occurrence as this type of fish is typically found at depths that are hundreds of feet lower. They live in a place that, for the most part, is inaccessible, except for people who have submersibles or remotely operated vehicles, Robison said in a phone call."
Diver Ted Judah and his wife Linda encountered an undulating, silvery ribbonfish near the surface off McAbee Beach in late December and shared photos to a local dive group. A Monterey Bay Aquarium marine biologist and an ichthyologist identified the animal as a juvenile king-of-the-salmon (Trachipterus altivelis). The species normally inhabits depths hundreds of feet below the surface and is seldom seen without submersibles or remotely operated vehicles. MBARI has recorded 16 sightings of king-of-the-salmon and six related ribbonfish over nearly four decades, with the most recent sighting in 2021. The Makah named the fish for guiding salmon to spawning grounds.
Read at www.latimes.com
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