Strange and fascinating: Monstrous looking deep sea fish washes up on California beach

New Delhi: In an unusual sighting, a rare deep-sea fish washed up ashore at the California's Crystal Cove State Park's Laguna Beach last Friday. The fish was shaped like a football and bore teeth as sharp as glass.

Taking to social media the Crystal Cove State Park informed about the sighting and shared images of the fish identifying it as the Pacific Football Fish.

Further, the fish was identified to be a female one, the post described: "...only females possess a long stalk on the head with bioluminescent tips used as a lure to entice prey in the darkness of waters as deep as 3,000 feet!" 

"Their teeth, like pointed shards of glass, are transparent and their large mouth is capable of sucking up and swallowing prey the size of their own body," it said.

"To see an actual angler fish intact is very rare and it is unknown how or why the fish ended up on the shore," it said in its Facebook post.

Calling it 'strange and fascinating' it said the fish was a testament to the diversity of marine life lurking below the water’s surface and wondered about how much is still to be learned from our wonderful ocean.

The sighting was noted by a visitor to Crystal Cove State Park in Southern California last Friday.