By Kimberly
Hickok, Reference Editor | August 27, 2018 04:33pm ET
Divers
visiting New Zealand's south coast of Wellington were looking for a nice spot
to go spearfishing Saturday morning (Aug. 25) when they spotted one of the
ocean's most impressive creatures of the deep: a dead, but fully intact, giant
squid.
"After
we went for a dive we went back to [the squid] and got a tape measure out, and
it measured 4.2 meters [13 feet] long," one of the divers, Daniel Aplin,
told the New
Zealand Herald.
A
representative from the New Zealand Department of Conservation told the Herald
that the divers most likely found a giant
squid (Architeuthis dux) and not a colossal
squid (Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni). [Photos
of the Stunning Deep-Sea Squid Feeding]
Strange
News Snapshot: Week of Aug. 19, 2018
A “sky
glow” named ‘Steve’, an ant making a break for it with a diamond , and new
signs of life in a field riddled with hundreds of dead headless reindeer.
Both
species of squid are formidable sea creatures, with giant squid typically
reaching 16 feet (5 m) long, according to
the Smithsonian, and the colossal squid reaching over 30 feet
(10 m) long, according to the
International Union for Conservation of Nature.
Scientists
know very little about these deep-sea-dwelling species, because the animals are
so rarely seen. Most observations come from the occasional specimen washing
ashore, as in this case, or getting accidently captured by
fishers.
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