Strange, 6.5-Foot Sea Creature Found in New Zealand

Museum officials have identified a strange sea
creature whose remains were recently located
on New Zealand's Waitarere Beach.
Earlier this week, veterinarian Maria Lombard
uploaded to Facebook photos of the
fascinatingly long creature's remains, which
garnered significant local media attention:
Lombard used a measuring tape to size up her
unexpected find, which was over 2 meters, or
6.5 feet, long.

In a follow-up tweet, curators from the Museum
of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa revealed
that the cartilaginous mass once comprised the
brain case and vertebrae of a New Zealand
smooth skate (Dipturus innominatus), a bottom-
dwelling animal found throughout the waters
surrounding the island nation.
The IUCN currently considers the species Near
Threatened, as it is often caught by trawl
fisheries as bycatch. While the species is
relatively abundant, it reproduces slowly and is
frequently caught before reaching sexual
maturity, making it more vulnerable to the
impacts of overfishing.