Found: A Rare Example of the Toothy Deep-Sea Lizard Fish

The RV Investigator is trawling the depths of the ocean in Australia’s eastern abyss, surveying 14 spots over the course of a month. Recently, as National Geographic reports, the team pulled up from a depth of about 2,500 m, a Bathysaurx ferox, a.k.a. a deep-sea lizard fish.

Because they live so far down in the ocean, these fish are rarely seen by humans, and they are a sight to behold!

Their large eyes and sharp teeth are characteristic of ambush predators, the Investigator’s Asher Flatt explains. If humans rarely see them, they also have a hard time finding each other, so these fish have both male and female reproductive organs to maximize reproductive opportunities. They can grow to about two feet long. One more point for the oceans-are-terrifying team?