Top 10 Weirdest Sea Creatures

No. 10 - Blobfish

blobfish

In case you ever wondered where the creator of Ziggy came up with the artistic concept, wonder no more. This fish (if "fish" we can really call it) is the weirdest looking sea creature we've ever seen. What's worse is that this animal is just as lazy as it looks and sounds...it barely expends any energy even eating, making sure it gobbles up whatever just happens to be floating by at the moment. So maybe a little less Ziggy ... a little more Al Bundy. Either way, it makes us seriously think about our carb intake.

No. 9 - Axolotl

Axolotl

Axolotls are like the cute anime pet you never had but always wanted, because you saw it on a deck of Pokémon cards. Tack onto that the ability to completely regenerate any dangling limb, and you've got yourself a real live Tamigachi! Another cool thing about axolotls is that they stay in their larval state even into adulthood, when they start becoming sexually mature—talk about babies having babies! Maury Povitch would have a field day with these weird sea creatures. Which of course, only makes them weirder.

No. 8 - Frilled Shark

frilled shark

Its oxymoronic-sounding name alone conjures up visions of a shark from a Disney movie—a fluffy, fun little animal that wags its fin like Pluto wags its tail. Well, perhaps that assessment isn't too far off. The frilled shark is not your typical shark, judging by looks alone. It closely resembles an eel—so much so that it's mistaken for an eel quite often, and the only real distinguishing features are its signature six gill slits (that's like a "Hell's Angel" tattoo for sea creatures).

One more weird thing about this sea creature: they came back from the dead. Well, sorta … these animals were long thought to be extinct (they had the fossils to prove it!). It wasn't until 2007 that someone witnessed a real live frilled shark wash up on the shore.

No. 7 - Anglerfish

angler fish

We'll say it, and we'll say it without fear: anglerfishes are ugly. There, we said it. They are disgusting bottom-dwellers, and if that isn't the lowest of the low, they also have a spine that doubles as bait for prey. They have big pointy teeth, and we're pretty sure you don't want to know what their mating habits are. All in all, "weird" only scratches the already scaly surface.

No. 6 - Loch Ness Monster

loch ness monster

While the Scottish Highlands have a history of having things appear out of the mist (is Brigadoon humor still in, or is 60+ years too much time?), it is the The Loch Ness Monster, or "Nessie" as we've come to know her, that has become the most popular Scottish Highlands' mist-dweller. The story goes that in August of 1933, the Courier published an article stating that a man had witnessed what appeared to be a dragon ... or at least, the closest thing he had ever seen to a dragon. Years passed, and evidence proving Nessie's existence (including photographs, video and even sonar) mounted. Because of this evidence, The Loch Ness Monster has been neither confirmed nor denied—though the scientists in the room may beg to differ.

No. 5 - Dana Octopus Squid

dana octopus squid

This weird sea creature mesmerizes its prey by flashing it—but not in the what's-under-that-trench-coat kind of way. In an actual, literal light-gets-in-your-eyes kind of way. By emitting flashes of light used to blind their prey, the Dana Octopus Squid successfully disorients, then captures them. Which begs the question: whatever happened to stimulating conversation?

No. 4 - Leafy Sea Dragon

sea dragon

The Leafy Sea Dragon is one of the few sea creatures with its own built-in camouflage. The tiny fins that are used to propel our leafy friend forward are impossible to see, giving the illusion that you are merely watching some seaweed lazily float by (like an underwater plastic bag à la American Beauty). So the next time you see a chunk of seaweed ... notice the beauty of it, yes. But also notice that you may just be witnessing one of the weirdest sea creatures in the world.

No. 3 - Longhorn Cowfish

cow fish

Although the Longhorn Cowfish tends to look like a hovercraft when it's moving along, it's not quite as fun as the Bumper Car-esque exterior it tends to exude. In fact, what it does exude is a poisonous toxin from the mucous secretions of their skin, rendering their flesh a deadly delicacy (should you be so inclined to eat one, since it has "cow" in the name and fast food these days will take anything they can get). The good news is, they tend to make a very distinct grunting noise when they've been captured—so just be sure to listen carefully to your next double cheeseburger.

No. 2 - Viperfish

viper fish

Even without the visual aid, we're pretty sure we can explain what a viperfish looks like: imagine a baseball bat with the head of Predator. Then add some scales and the gnarliest teeth you've ever seen (they are so large, they don't even fit in its mouth—they curve backward up toward its eyes). Finally, it has a radio antenna on top of its Predator head—you know, so it doesn't miss the game. Well, that's not entirely true: the "radio antenna" actually works as a fishing lure for its prey. By flashing the light at the tip on and off, it attracts passers-by that may (or may not, in most cases) want to be eaten. Sort of like a taxi cab! Although you're probably safer in a viper ... fish, that is.

No. 1 - Vampire Squid

vampire squid

Helping it stay true to its name, the Vampire Squid comes complete with its own cape, made from arms connected by black webbing. The webbing help propel it through the water and almost fly like—you guessed it—a bat. But by far, the coolest/weirdest thing about this sea creature is its ability to hypnotize its prey using what's knowns as "photophores" on its arms. So basically it's a living, breathing dance club.

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Vampire Bats Have Vein Sensors

Mammals "extreme" heat-sensing ability in facial nerves, study shows.

Beneath their furry faces, vampire bats boast nerves specially attuned to body temperatures (file picture).

Here's a finding that might make your blood run cold—vampire bats have specially evolved nerves that can sense the heat of your veins.

Scientists already knew that vampire bats have snakelike pit organs in their faces that point the mammals to the juiciest parts of their prey—the veins. But it was unknown how the predators located those choice biting spots.

Now a study has shown that bats have evolved special facial nerves that can detect body temperatures as low as 89.6 degrees Fahrenheit (32 degrees Celsius).

The vampire bat is "clearly adapted in a lot of unusual ways for a very unusual lifestyle—this is one more example," said study co-author Nicholas Ingolia, a genomics researcher at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Baltimore, Maryland.

People have a similar heat-sensitive channel, but it's only activated by painfully hot stimuli, such as touching a hot stove. The vampire bat, the study found, has two forms of heat-sensitive channels, one to sense painful heat—like us—and another to zero in on its prey's veins.

Such an evolutionary adaptation—known previously only in three snake species—is especially crucial for the vampire bat, which needs a blood meal every one or two days to stay alive.

The vein-sensing ability is "an extreme version of an existing trait, Ingolia said. Other bats have the gene for this hypersensitive channel, but only the bloodsuckers' bodies appear to activate the gene.

Whoa: Vampire Bats Related to Horses?

In the study, Ingolia and colleagues isolated the nerve cells that travel to the pit organs in the bat's face and compared them with the sensory nerve cells that go to the rest of the bat's body.

The nerve cells were anatomically different from the regular, pain-sensing nerve cells, which means the vein-sensing cells convey separate information, Ingolia said.

The team also looked at vampire bat genes and found the same heat-sensing gene is found throughout the body, but the gene results in a different type of nerve cell in the pit organs.

The genetic work also revealed more about vampire bats' relationships to other mammals. Despite their ratlike appearance, the bats proved surprisingly similar, genetically speaking, to cows and horses, according to the study, to be published tomorrow in the journal Nature.

The horse connection might not be so surprising to anyone who's seen a vampire bat in action.

Hunting under the cover of darkness in the American tropics, the bat gallops, horselike, along the ground, approaching its prey on all fours. Razor-sharp teeth slice into the victim's vein, and the bat laps up the trickling blood with its tongue.

Related :

 video: "Vampire Bats Biting People."

 "Vampire Bats Attacking Cattle as Rain Forest Falls."

Credit: Christine Dell'Amore,  National Geographic News

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How large can lobsters grow? (Weird Science)

Lobsters can grow to be four feet long, 40 pounds, and maybe 100 years old – maybe even more.

on this June 1 photo Skipper Landon Shand, left, and crewmember Lorne Pace show off a 23 lb. male lobster they caught on their final run of the closing day of Southwestern Nova Scotia's lobster season in Yarmouth, N.S. Brian Medel-Halifax Chronicle-Herald/The Canadian Press/AP

With New England diving into lobster season, seafood lovers across the country will don their bibs, grab some lemon wedges, and dine on nice one-pound crustaceans.

Long live the lobster!

Most lobsters in supermarkets and restaurants fall in the one- to two-pound range. American law requires fishermen to toss back anything smaller. But lobsters can get bigger – much bigger.

In 2006, a diver caught a 12-pound, 20-inch lobster off the coast of San Diego. In 2008, a Canadian crew snagged a 20-pounder. Yet both of those were pipsqueaks compared with the late king of crustaceans. The Guinness World Record went to a 44.3-pound lobster found in 1977 near Nova Scotia. Guinness didn't note its length, but the US Navy once measured a similarly hefty lobster at four feet long.

These clawed colossi aren't freaks or flukes, explains Jelle Atema, a professor of biology at Boston University. They're just very old.

Lobsters, he says, seem to never stop growing. Their crustacean cousins, crabs, reach a point at which the carapace (the outer shell) simply will not grow any larger. But nature never hemmed in lobsters.

"They keep on growing," says Dr. Atema. "You can end up with very, very large lobsters."

How large? Scientists have no idea.

Any lobster that found its way to a dinner plate legally needs to have a carapace of about three inches or longer. Critters that length are often a little heavier than one pound and between 5 and 7 years old.

Twenty- to 40-pound catches could easily be more than 50 years old.

But here's what really confounds scientists: Those ancient lobsters don't show any signs of aging.

They do not slow down. They do not grow weaker. They do not become infertile. In fact, lobsters are actually more fertile in their old age.

This doesn't mean that lobsters live forever. Some wander into human traps. Some starve. Some become meals for seal or cod. But if you kept them healthy, safe, and happy, "lobsters can potentially get to be 100 years old," says Atema. "Whether they actually do, we don't know."

And we won't know for decades. Researchers have started counting lobster birthdays, but, Atema says, "we've never done it to a point where we can say 'oh yeah, here's an 85-year-old lobster.' "

"If my grandson was interested, I could encourage him to do that," he says with a laugh. "Or pass it on down through generations."

At this point, scientists know that lobsters grow faster in warmer water and where temperatures remain constant throughout the year, such as in laboratory tanks or in deep waters miles from the coast. For example, the Gulf of Maine Research Institute reports that lobsters raised in 70-degree water can plump up to one pound in less than two years – about three times faster than in the cold Atlantic.

As lobsters bulk up, they regularly outgrow their shells. Once a waistline feels a little snug, a lobster will shed its carapace, pump itself full of water to a larger size, then harden the outside into a new shell. (This is where soft-shell lobsters come from. They're lobsters caught during this molting period.)

Humans and snakes also shed their skin over time, but their skeletons eventually stop growing. Since lobsters don't have bones, only this outer armor, they can shed and grow indefinitely – hence four-foot leviathans.

These regenerating shells add further mystique to the ageless lobster. With young lobsters molting every few months and adults shedding about once a year, Atema says, "it looks as though they are brand-new again and that they haven't aged, which many people would be jealous of."

But age is important, he says. The laws against catching small lobsters keeps humans from overharvesting. Six years gives the crustaceans enough time to reproduce at least once and possibly twice.

The law "has become very effective at maintaining a lobster population," he says. "There are more lobsters living in Maine, it's estimated, than ever before in the history of lobsters." (Other factors play into this prosperity, such as humans fishing predatory cod.)

Since lobsters grow more fertile with age, Maine also bars fishermen from catching elder lobsters – anything with a carapace longer than five inches. With such protections, who knows what might be out there, growing in a deep-sea cave for the past 100 years?

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Sc/Barbicambarus simmonsi: New giant crayfish species discovered

The new giant crayfish should not have been easily overlooked, as it is huge – twice the size of other species, the team at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Eastern Kentucky University said.

Barbicambarus simmonsi

A new species of giant crayfish, named Barbicambarus simmonsi, found in Tennessee, is pictured here in this image released to Reuters Jan. 20. The new crayfish at about 5 inches long, is huge -- twice the size of other species, the team at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Eastern Kentucky University said. 

Photo credit: Carl Williams/Reuters 

A new species of giant crayfish literally crawled out from under a rock in Tennessee, proving that large new species of animals can be found in highly populated and well-explored places, researchers said

The new crayfish should not have been easily overlooked, as it is huge -- twice the size of other species, the team at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Eastern Kentucky University said.

But the crustacean is also quite rare, they report in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington.

"This isn't a crayfish that someone would have picked up and just said, 'Oh, it's another crayfish,' and put it back,'' said University of Illinois aquatic biologist Chris Taylor, one of the researchers.

"You would have recognized it as something really, really different and you would have saved it,'' Taylor added in a statement.

Taylor and Guenter Schuster of Eastern Kentucky University found their first specimen of the new species under one of the biggest rocks in the deepest part of a commonly explored Tennessee creek.

The new species, called Barbicambarus simmonsi, is about 5 inches long and has antennae covered with a sensitive fringe of tiny, hair-like bristles, called setae.

More than half of the 600 known species of crayfish in the world are found in North America, Taylor said.

"This thing had not been seen by scientific eyes until last year,'' he said.

We spend millions of dollars every year on federal grants to send biologists to the Amazon, to Southeast Asia -- all over the world looking for and studying the biodiversity of those regions,'' Schuster said. ``But the irony is that there's very little money that is actually spent in our own country to do the same thing. And there are still lots of areas right here in the U.S. that need to be explored.''

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