23 February, 2018
According to the Ministry of Environment Protection and Agriculture, specialists of the Fisheries and Black Sea Monitoring Department have studied the case and found out that this kind of fish belongs to the "Lophius piscatorius," also sometimes called monkfish, which lives into
Lophius piscatorius, commonly known as the angler, is a monkfish in the family Lophiidae. It is found in coastal waters of the northeast Atlantic, from the Barents Sea to the Strait of Gibraltar, the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. Within some of its range, including the Irish Sea, this species comprises a significant commercial fishery.
Discovering this fish is an important scientific fact
As the experts note, this kind of fish is very rare in Black Sea, it reaches Georgia from the Mediterranean Sea Basin. Based on the fact that the deep layers of the Black sea (at a level below 130 meters) is saturated with hydrogen sulphide, and monkfish is a typical inhabitant of DNA, discovering this fish is an important scientific fact.
This is for the third time that monkfish has been discovered in Georgia.
This kind of fish is very rare in Black Sea
For the first time, “sea devil” was discovered in the Black Sea in 1955. Stuffed monkfish is still kept in the Museum of Adjara, Georgia’s seaside region.
Later, monkfish was discovered in 2008 in the waters of Poti, a port city in Georgia, located on the eastern Black Sea coast in the region of Samegrelo-Zemo Svaneti. It was sent to the National Museum of Georgia.
Monkfish
As reported by the Ministry of Environment Protection and Agriculture, the experts of the Fisheries and Black Sea Monitoring Department are currently exploring the Black Sea and will carry on their scientific investigations in the future.
Monkfish or monkfish European is a predatory fish, which got its name from the strange appearance.
Monkfish or monkfish European is a predatory fish
It has a very large head which is broad, flat, and depressed; the rest of the body appears to be a mere appendage. The wide mouth extends all the way around the anterior circumference of the head, and both jaws are armed with bands of long, pointed teeth. These are inclined inwards, and can be closed so as to offer no impediment to an object gliding towards the stomach, but to prevent its escape from the mouth.
The pectoral and ventral fins are so articulated as to perform the functions of feet, the fish being enabled to "walk" on the bottom of the sea, where it generally hides itself in the sand or among seaweed.
It has a very large head which is broad, flat, and depressed
All around its head and also along the body, the skin bears fringed appendages resembling short fronds of seaweed. These structures, combined with the ability to change the color of the body to match its surroundings, assists the fish greatly in concealing itself in its lurking places, which are selected for their abundance of prey.
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