A rare and very unusual shark was caught by fishermen trawling off Green Cape, south of Eden on the NSW south coast last Thursday.
The creepy looking fish, known as a goblin shark (Mitsukurina owstoni), was accidentally caught by local fisherman in a net along with a load of crayfish.
The shark is sometimes called a "living fossil" and is usually found near the sea floor at depths of about 1200 metres.
The trawlermen knew they had found something unusual, with local man "old Errol" saying he had never seen one in the flesh in all his decades of fishing in local waters.
Luckily, Merimbula had the expertise of the Wharf Aquarium curator Michael McMaster and Alan Scrymgeour, from the Sapphire Coast Marine Discovery Centre on hand.
The two enthusiastically examined the animal on Thursday after it was handed over to the aquarium.
Mr Scrymgeour described the shark as belonging to an "evolutionary dead end", being the only species in its genus, which stopped evolving about 70 million years ago, during the dinosaur era.
He said this specimen would be only two to three years old, given its length of approximately 1.2 metres. Adult goblin sharks grow to a length of 3.8m.
Mr McMaster said very little is known about these elusive creatures, normally found in deep waters around the world.
He said, however, that they find their prey using hundreds of small sensors in their 'nasal paddle' which detect small electrical fields produced by the crustaceans and cephalopods they feed upon.
"Their teeth are often found in underwater electrical cables," Mr McMaster said.
"A lot of fishermen have been saying that the currents are very different this year," added Mr McMaster, which, he said, may have something to do with how this shark found its way into the net.
Wharf Aquarium will now send the fish to the Australian Museum in Sydney for their collection.
This story first appeared in the Merimbula News Weekly.
