You may have come across many horror stories of fishes and other marine animals found with harmful plastic contaminants or trash inside their bodies. However, this unusual discovery inside a fish is surprising biologists and netizens alike. In a bizarre incident, a fish was found with a whole live turtle inside its stomach. The discovery was made by a biologist from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FFWCC). The FFWCC with Wildlife Research Institute had sent out members of the team to collect tissue samples from fish.
One of the researchers noticed something unusual and was immediately alert. There was “movement coming from the stomach of a bass.”
The FWC Fish and Wildlife Research Institute posted the whole incident to their Facebook page. Here they described the tale as “Field Notes from a Freshwater Biologist: Avoiding Turtle Disaster!”
In a very poetic post, they set the scenery of how the sun was just rising over the grassy waters of the Florida Everglades when the FWC biologists launched their airboats. They were there to collect some largemouth bass.
The next scene is the lab bench, white-coat clad scientists take tissue samples, measure the specimen, collect otoliths, and determine the sex of all the bass they have acquired. “A biologist notices something out of the ordinary, movement coming from the stomach of a bass. The biologist carefully opens the stomach and something unexpected is inside…. a live turtle!,” the post continues.
They say how finding a live turtle inside a dead fish isn’t something normal or regular. The picture posted along this caption features a tiny green-brown turtle, a mere baby.
Again, the post becomes poetic in setting the scene—the sun is setting, mosquitos buzz, and the biologist inches toward the edge of the water to place the turtle in the grass. They stand and watch as the tiny turtle waddles into the waters and ducks under surface, hopefully swimming away to a long, happy life.
“All scientists should write and communicate this eloquently! Best field notes ever” commented a user.
This is not the first of its kind discovery. In March 2020, Catch Em All Fishing YouTube channel posted a video where a man pulls out a live turtle from a living fish who was choking because of the turtle in its mouth.