{"id":140038,"date":"2025-09-13T02:46:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-13T02:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/140038\/"},"modified":"2025-09-13T02:46:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T02:46:08","slug":"photos-sunfish-mistaken-for-shark-spotted-on-california-beach","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/140038\/","title":{"rendered":"PHOTOS: Sunfish mistaken for shark spotted on California beach"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"FILE<\/a> <\/p>\n

FILE – This new species of snailfish, known as the bumpy snailfish, was first seen in 2019 off the coast of California by a Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute team.<\/p>\n

BODEGA BAY, Calif.\u2013 Reports of sharks swimming near a jetty over the weekend at a California<\/a> beach ended up with the discovery of an unusual type of fish.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Instead of sharks, the creatures were sunfish, a type of large open-water fish, according to Sonoma County Regional Parks<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The specific sunfish spotted was a rare one, known as a mola tecta, a sunfish only formally identified in 2017.\u00a0<\/p>\n

MEET THE BUMPY SNAILFISH, ONE OF 3 NEW DEEP-SEA SPECIES DISCOVERED<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Mola <\/p>\n

Mola tecta sunfish have flat, disc-like bodies.<\/p>\n

(Sonoma County Regional Parks \/ Facebook \/ FOX Weather)<\/p>\n

Commonly known as a hoodwinker sunfish, they’re often mistaken for mola mols, a more common type of sunfish.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Both species are found in the Pacific Ocean, according to the Marine Education & Research Society<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Sonoma County Regional Parks said one of the sunfish didn’t survive and washed up on the beach in Doran Regional Park over the weekend.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Photos showed the large fish, with its flat, disc-like body and large fins, sort of resembling a shark, washed onto the beach<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

INVASIVE MONGOOSE CAPTURED IN HAWAII, SPARKING RENEWED CONCERNS<\/a><\/p>\n

Park rangers notified local wildlife <\/a>agencies about the beached fish, but it will not be removed.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Nature will now take over, returning nutrients back into the ecosystem,” Sonoma County Regional Parks said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The agency reminded visitors to leave the sunfish alone if they see it, just like they should with any animal that washes ashore.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FILE – This new species of snailfish, known as the bumpy snailfish, was first seen in 2019 off…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":140039,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[49,48,66,323],"class_list":{"0":"post-140038","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wildlife","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-science","11":"tag-wildlife"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140038","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=140038"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140038\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/140039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140038"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140038"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140038"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}