For The Skeptics Out There; New Cyclops Shark Photos

Shark expert Dr. Felipe Galvan holds the shark where the gill slits can be clearly seen

Dr. Felipe Galvan records the measurements of the unusual catch

Dr. Galvan from the Mexican Institute of Sciences shows the front view of a clearly, slightly deteriorated shark.

The original photo, where the shark looks much fresher and cute in fact.

The unusual bull shark fetus that we posted a couple of weeks ago continues to get a lot of attention. People from Europe are especially fascinated by it and we have been contacted by people in England and France this week by different publications wanting to know more about it.

We have had a lot of skeptics telling us that this is a joke, that a "cabbage patch doll must be missing an eye somewhere" etc but this is real and these new photos seem to prove it. Dr. Felipe Galvan a respected scientist stated "This is extremely rare, as far as I know less than 50 examples of an abnormality like this have been recorded".  He went on to add, "The water in the Sea of Cortez is one of the cleanest in the world, so it is not likely that this is a factor". Once the paper on this has been accepted and published we shall share with you here.

Cyclops Shark Update

The interest in the weird shark has been amazing, thousands of people have seen the photos and we have been contacted by different organizations, publications and individuals from around the world. There are a lot skeptics but we assure you that this is real.

We just spoke to the commercial fisherman who caught the bull shark that had the albino one-eyed baby inside of it and he filled in some of the details for us. The mother bull shark was caught on what is known locally as a "simplera", this is a large cork buoy which is attached to a sack of sand as an anchor to keep it on the bottom, a smaller buoy is then attached horizontally to the main buoy by a line, with a  smaller  vertical line hanging down with a hook on it. The hook was baited with ballyhoo. The fisherman set the equipment up off of Isla Cerralvo then went back later to see what he had caught. When they reached this "simplera" and brought it up there was a dead female bullshark that weighed 286 lbs and was almost ten feet long. Back at the beach where the shark was filleted they found ten pups inside of her. All of them normal except for the one posted here, which was albino and had the one "eye". The fisherman told me that this one would have been born first, due to the position it was in -first in line at the exit, but that he doubted that it would have survived. Scientists currently have it in their possession and are performing tests.

It's sad to hear of this large female with pups inside killed, but this was taken by a commercial fishing skiff (panga) and this is how the fisherman makes a living to take care of his family. All parts of the shark are used, including the skin. The meat is salted and sent to mainland Mexico where it is usually sold as bacalo or "cod".

General Area where the female Bull-Shark was caught

Pisces Sportfishing will continue to bring you more on this story as it unfolds.