An Australian fisherman has sparked intrigue in the fishing community – after apparently reeling in the severed head of a giant Mako shark.
‘Trapman Bermagui’ – aka Jason – posted a picture of his haul to Facebook, sparking speculation as to just what kind of creature could have decapitated such a large shark.
He wrote: “Unfortunately, we didn’t see what ate it but must of been impressive! [sic] The head was about 100kg.
“It was a crazy morning of shark fishing. Hoping to catch smaller sharks but just hooked big sharks that had been eaten by bigger sharks again.
“When I thought I’d seen it all, we cut about 35kg of meat off the mako head and discovered it had a marlin bill embedded in its head!”
Fishermen and armchair theorists alike have joined the debate, suggesting other, bigger sharks, killer whales, a megaladon emerging from 25 million years of extinction and that perennial favourite, the Loch Ness monster, could be behind the kill.
Others simply suggest camera trickery, guessing Jason was deliberately standing a considerable distance away from head to make it look larger.
Greg Doble wrote: “Great white, more than one as well, you can see the smaller or conveyor teeth outside major bite marks, not Orcas, they tend to eat just the liver of large sharks and let the rest drop to the ocean floor.”
Aaron Smith agreed: “Looks like it’s been hit by two sharks to me.”
Shark cannibalism is not unheard of and in 2014 the Smithsonian Institute aired a documentary exploring how a 9ft long great white shark came to be devoured by a much larger creature.
The mystery began when a tracking device formerly attached to the shark washed up in 2004, four months later, showing signs of being bleached by stomach acid.
Experts claimed whatever had swallowed the device had a stomach area at least 1m wide.