14 DAY TRIAL // Just the other day, a positively colossal eel was pulled by fishermen from the waters off the coast of the city of Plymouth in Devon, UK.
The mammoth creature, shown in the photos accompanying this article, was captured quite by mistake. Thus, the fishermen only got their hands on it after it got caught in the nets of a trawler.
The eel was just a few meals away from setting a new record
Having freed the eel from the nets keeping it captive, the crew of British fishermen weighed it and found it to tip the scale at an astounding 131 pounds (roughly 59.5 kilograms).
They also measured it and determined its length to be one of 20 feet (about 6 meters), greater than the height of the average double decker bus in the UK.
“This conger eel is a very large fish, and an unusual catch for a trawler,” Pete Bromley, manager of Plymouth Fisheries, told the press in an interview.
“These large eels are generally found hiding in the many wrecks around the South West, or on reefs and rocky ground, but they do venture out to open ground in search of food,” he added.
Despite its impressive body size, it looks like this eel caught off the coast of Devon is not the absolute largest fish of this kind to have until now been caught and measured.
The record is held by an eel weighing a jaw-dropping 133 pounds (60.3 kilograms) that was captured back in 1995, also in the waters close to Devon's shoreline, The Guardian informs.
The fish likely grew to be that big because it never got to breed
Pete Bromley believes that the recently caught mammoth eel grew to be taller than a double decker because it never had the opportunity to breed and deliver a new generation.
He explains that, since eels die after spawning, it's safe to assume that this aquatic beast was never a mom and so had little to worry about except growing bigger and bigger at a steady pace.
