Doomsday Fish! what you need to know about the most terrible inhabitant of the ocean, which portends disaster
The Herring King or Doomsday Fish is a three-meter giant that lives at a depth of 1000 meters. It recently surfaced in the Pacific Ocean for the first time, causing panic in Taiwan and the Philippines. What does the mysterious appearance of the monster mean?
The other day it became known that for the first time in many years, the mysterious Doomsday Fish rose from the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, which is officially called the Herring King or Belt Fish.
We are talking about a marine life from 3 to 17 meters long with silvery scales along the entire ribbon-like body. Interestingly, this fish cannot move horizontally, which is why its vertical swimming evokes such an emotional response in people — it looks really quite sinister.
The first mention of mystical encounters with fish dates back to the 18th century in Norway, and in some stories the Doomsday Fish is described as a monster with a horse’s head with a fluttering fiery red mane.
For such a mane, apparently, they took the long rays of the dorsal fin, forming a «plume» on the head of the fish.
Interestingly, the appearance of the Herring King often coincides with the period of earthquakes and this is easily explained. The thing is that such individuals live at a depth of about 1000 meters and any seismic activity forces them to rise to the surface in search of food.
By the way, the Doomsday Fish most often feeds on plankton or shoals of herring, for which it got its name.
The Herring King lives in warm and moderately warm waters of the Pacific, Atlantic and Indian oceans at a depth of 50-700 m (also called depths from 20 to 200 meters and even 1000 meters) and sometimes comes across on the surface.
Individual specimens are found washed ashore after a storm. Herring kings have not yet been caught in Russian waters, but are found off the coast of Norway and in the southern and eastern parts of the Sea of Japan.
