Sea Monsters

[Eric]

For hundreds of years, naturalists have reported great beasts dwelling in the deep places of the sea. Sea Serpents of enormous length and breadth. Massive octopi and squid who could smash ships with but a flick of their mighty tentacles. Could any of these things actually exist? Consider Bloop, scientists have been hearing a strange sound from sonar stations down in the deep, their technology has told them it's a natural sound and that the creature that makes it must be many times larger than the largest whale. What is it? Does The Kraken dwell in the depths, in it's ancient, dreamless sleep? Are sea monsters real? Or even plausible?

[BKB]

I believe the Oceans are too unexplored and too big for there not to be some strange marine life out there. Throughout the centuries there have been mistaken identities for sea monsters, whales, squids etc and probably some hoaxs but there are several cases that are so honest and descriptions so detailed i cannot believe they are false. Michael Newton's Encyclopadia of Cryptozoology A global guide has some great cases for hundreds of sea serpents and the books by Bernard Heuvelman especially in the wake of sea serpents

Anyone coming on here saying they definetly do not exist is simply lying to themselves or being very obtuse imo

[Garbarsardar]

Yep, I believe in the existance of the giant squid. Because it has been reported by credible sources with lots of evidence: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4288772.stm
http://tolweb.org/Architeuthis

The rest:

Cryptozoology?

The amazing thing with all these "lost" and secretive animals or as cryptozoologists call them "cryptids" is that
1. They are always big. Small and crypyid generally does not cut it.
2. They are often seen, heard, sensed but always elude documentation. Every picture consisting of more than a blur has been debunked.
3. They are usually outside every biological category
4. They invariably fail to leave remains or fossilized remains

Example; A researcher working away in the bowels of a museum comes across an uncatalogued skin that she does not recognize. Documentation states that it was collected in the Amazon basin in 1893. A cross check of all available literature fails to turn up any further reference. However, the skin is real, and the animal definitely existed at some time. (Actually stuff like this happens often, and it will probably continue for quite a while.) If our hypothetical researcher decides to mount an expedition to find live examples, they are now stepping into the realm of Cryptozoology, as the search is now on for an unknown animal. Much of Cryptozoology is concerned with exactly this, a search for animals that have not been seen for a long time, and are considered extinct by most authorities. Recent examples would be the Thylacine or marsupial wolf of Tasmania, the Moas of New Zealand, and the Passenger Pigeon of North America. The approach that many researchers take is definitely unscientific, overly credulous, and naïve, but it is possible to take a scholarly, respectable attitude. After all, many animals declared extinct have been found alive and well, and sometimes in healthy populations. The Chacoan Peccary, previously known only from Ice Age bones, was found alive in South America, the Bermuda Petrel was declared extinct twice yet still cruises the Atlantic Ocean, and just within the past few days it has been announced that the Cuban Solenodon, a primitive shrew-like mammal, has been rediscovered.

There is one major snag with these findings as it relates to our subject; few if any such discoveries have been anticipated in the Cryptozoological literature. They are continually looking for long lost animals without success, but missing the real ones tripped over by undergrads tromping the bushes gathering mundane data on bird droppings. A glaring case would be that of the Coelacanth, that well known ancient fish rediscovered off the Comoros Islands in 1938 after about a 65 million year hiatus. For years some Cryptozoologists have whispered about a supposed population in the Caribbean, but a few years ago a doctor on honeymoon in Indonesia discovered one for sale at a local fish market. Subsequent searches have confirmed a new population there, perhaps a distinct species. If you wanted to find a sea further from the Caribbean, you would have to walk in the footsteps of Armstrong and Aldrin.

http://www.skeptics.ca/articles/bail...tozoology.html

For more obtuse information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptozoology
http://members.aol.com/dalecoz/dale3.htm

[MaximiIian]

How do you explain the "bloop" signal, then?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloop
http://archives.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science/06/13/bloop/

[BKB]

So every report and every sighting of a say, a sea serpent, is false. Fishermen who know the local marine life would surely know the difference between a whale and long necked sea serpent type creature. Chay blyth and john ridegway in their crossing of the Atlantic in 1966 reorting seeeing such a lond necked creature coming near their boat. Now these fellas knew the marine life, sharks, rays, etc and they are convinced they saw something. Without us being there we will perhaps never know what they saw but that does not mean we can simply dismiss their sightings.

Australian fishermen of Broughton island in 1918 would not go into the waters for three days after a monsterous shark attacked fishing boats, nets and cray pots causing havoc which was like that of GWS but nearly all white and at least double its size, some reports at least over 50 feet long.

Now overestimations aside thats a hell of shark and sea monster of huge proportions. These fisherman couldn't afford any days out of the sea because they and their families would go hungry. They saw something that scared the hell out of them and there story has to be looked and at least considered.

New species are found every day, the monsterous sized megamouth whoch was discovered only in 1975 by the U.S. navy and the Giant squid seem alive in the sea last year on film prove that still big sea creatures are being discovered and until we have explored the length and depth of the oceans i will still believe some large marine life unknown to science is out there

I believe that the oceans are too big and deep for

[Spiff]

Things like this are fascinating to me, and as said, so much of the ocean is unexplored that i personaly would have trouble completely ruling out even the most far fetched theories.

I personaly wouldnt go looking though.. deep water creeps me out, and then theres films featuring such things as this



bleh


Though i must say even when you Listen to the Bloop sound speeded up 16 time apparently.. it doesnt sound that remarkable. But then im no marine scientist

[Garbarsardar]

How do you explain the "bloop" signal, then?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloop
http://archives.cnn.com/2002/TECH/science/06/13/bloop/

If you read carefully the site of the people who heard the "Bloop" and the "Slow down" you will see that there is no way to determine if the source was organic or not. If the first thing that comes to your mind is "Sea Monster!", well that denotes just a possibility amongst many...
http://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov/explor...seasounds.html

Of course no one can dismiss the probability of existance of unknown deep water species. But the evidence presented is suspiciously uncorroborated and reminiscent of the evidence about UFOs that peaked in the fifties and sixties and then slowly died in the eighties...

[Fenris]

The portion of wildlife we know on earth is very small, let alone the water, and even less such environnements as the abyss and such. So we cannot dismiss much theories easily. They however stay theories.

[Stalins Ghost]

Last Year some Japanese scientists managed to take some photo's erm...relevant to this topic.
OK so we've known about giant squid for a while now, but its nice to see some life photographs

I think it's supposedly something like 90% of the sea floor that has not been covered, so thats one helluva lot of area for sea creatures to live. I would argue that "large" monsters are probably less likely to exist, since generally speaking large creatures prefer the shallow waters: e.g. Sharks, Whales.

That said, Giant Squids are often thought to be "shallow water" creatures, and we rarely see them. So you never know!

[Eric]

Too late, mine is bigger.

[Sétanta]

We can't know yet because we don't have the technology to expolore down there and some of these creatures are smart and rare enough that we won't see them for a long time.

Giant Squid exist but to what size do they get? We don't know and they are probably the tip of the iceberg

[MaximiIian]

We can't know yet because we don't have the technology to expolore down there and some of these creatures are smart and rare enough that we won't see them for a long time.

Giant Squid exist but to what size do they get? We don't know and they are probably the tip of the iceberg

Well, most giant squids found are about 50 feet long. These 50-footers have four-inch sucker diameters, and they find Sperm whales all the time with 4-in sucker scars.
However, they have found some sperm whales with 16-inch sucker scars. Extrapolate that ****.

That is one big cephalopod.

[Eric]

Now a 50 ft squid has 4 inch suckers. So we can assume that is 4 inches of sucker for ever 50 feet of squid. 4x4=16, 50x4=200 feet. And Colossal Squid can get even bigger. Sweet Jesus! I think I messed up somewhere. The Kraken?

[Osceola]

You think there could be 50 foot shark out there? Like one that will eat you?

[Kscott]

I've seen a dead giant squid. The one i saw was like 20ft? Not really sure, but it was big. As for other things who knows? The Kracken proved to be real. AS for sea serpents isnt there that huge long fish thingy that looks very much like reports of sea serpents? Myhts often have fact to em. I think there are probably alot more out there, ut we can never know. I certainly hope so. Its always amazing to find some new giant.

[Da Skinna]

There's a lot about the giant squid and they do officially exist, but have never been seen alive in their natural habitat. There's some that have washed up or been caught and have measured like 60 feet but all are reputed to be small ones, not fully matured. It's insane that there's something so huge down there. I wonder what global warming will do to them... maybe they'll start living closer to the surface, which should be very interesting. Meh.

I've watched things about deep-sea creatures, and boy they are bizarre, scary, very alien things. I saw this one video on a show that was from a Japanese submarine at the bottom of the ocean, and it shows what first appears to be a rock wall off to the right side of the screen. Few seconds later, a fish, one they know about that they said was over a dozen feet long, swims across and hits head first into the rock wall. Well, it wasn't a wall. The fish bolts the other way and the wall moves slowly into the darkness of the abyss, they didn't see a head or a tail, so some have speculated it was indeed a massive SEA SERPENT, that ripples its way across the ocean floor.

I have no doubt there's some huge things down there, since we've only searched like 5% of the ocean floor, there's bound to be something we'll come across. I just hope I'll live long enough to see what it is.

[Eric]

Yes, we have seen a live giant squid before. Some Japanese scientists got footage by following the Sperm Whales which hunt squid and then going deep, deep sea trawling in that area with foods that would attract Giant Squid.

[MaximiIian]

You think there could be 50 foot shark out there? Like one that will eat you?

Prabably not, unless it's some relict Megaldon, which is not incredibly likely.
Now, 38-, maybe 40-footer? Possible. The largest great white shark was, IIRC, 32 feet or so. Pretty big sucka.

isnt there that huge long fish thingy that looks very much like reports of sea serpents?

Oarfish. Get about 11-15 feet long usually. Very serpentine, and could easily be mistaken for a giant snakey thingy. Another possibility are giant eels that we probably don't see much of, perhaps hunted to extinction, like the dodo, by "dragon hunters".
Some things that people could easily mistakenly identify as 'sea serpents' in the past could be things like whales, manta rays, and other et cetera.

[BKB]

The biggest great white was measured at 23-24 feet, caught off cuba i think.

[Stalins Ghost]

However, they have found some sperm whales with 16-inch sucker scars. Extrapolate that ****.

I've decided to avoid the sea from now on