UPATED INFORMATION: Mystery Solved . . .
Paraguayan Mystery Fish
With Arms And Legs
Source: Infobae.com
We have just recieved word this morning of the fact that the photo accompanying the specimen of the "fish with hands and feet" supposedly pulled out of a body of water in Paraguay actually represents another marine specimen, the Pacific Spookfish -- one of the many rare specimens displaced by the tsunami following the Great Sumatra Earthquake of 2005.
"While the news item did exist and originally appeared in the Paraguayan media, the photograph accompanying the INFOBAE note has nothing to do with the fish allgedly recovered from an embankment near Colonia Navidad. "This image, along with several others, formed part of a chain of e-mails that went around the world depicting fish that supposedly washed up on beaches as a result of the Asian tsunami. You can read about this at this link. "The fish that appears in the Infobae photograph is a long-nosed Chimaera from the Rhinochimeridae group. These are deep-water fish, distantly related to sharks, who employ their "noses" to dig up the sea floor and detect small prey. As can be imagined, it is rather unlikely that a deep water fish would have appeared in an embankment of a landlocked country. "Furthermore, there are several species of freshwater lunged fish that have fins adapted to drag themselves along land when the puddles and small ponds the occupy become dessicated. Some can even climb trees if the need arises."
ORIGINAL ENTRY AS FOLLOWS
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A group of Paraguayan fishermen had quite a surprise when they pulled two green fish out of the San Rafael stream in Asuncion's Zevallos Cue district. One of the specimens had hands and feet.
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Their surprise was even greater when they noticed that the specimen began walking toward the water after having been set down on the ground, according to Paraguay's El Popular newspaper.
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"It's too much. Seeing such things frightens me. We grabbed the net and brought it home, but we don't know what it is," said one of the protagonists of the story to the neighboring country's newspaper.
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Actually the specimen was found before the 2005 Tsunami.