Comments on: Missouri River Monster Captured

By: things-in-the-woods

things-in-the-woods — Sat, 12 May 2007 13:49:58 +0000

I like the way it says “We know not…what it looks like, or how to describe it”, and then goes on to describe what it looks like.

By: mystery_man

mystery_man — Sat, 12 May 2007 01:03:49 +0000

Dogu4- I too am very interested in Japanese animals, both cryptid and known. As you may know, I live in Japan, and I have spent time studying and doing research on various Japanese species. I am especially interested in the ecological effects of foreign and invasive species on indigenous animals and habitats here.

To answer your question, the giant salamander mainly prefers the cold water because it is inheritely oxygen rich. The only reason I have been able to have experience with the giant salamander is because I live in Japan and happen to have worked with a Japanese zoologist who was involved in conservation efforts to protect the species. I have also helped to translate papers concerning the salamanders occasionally, most recently one on the threat that the Chinese variety may be causing as it has started to become more numerous in Japan.

By: dogu4

dogu4 — Fri, 11 May 2007 18:25:12 +0000

Same here Mystery Man…I likewise have an interest in all things Nihon, so that’s interesting that you’ve had experience with the giant salamander.
Cold water facilitates the uptake of O2…is that because the water is richer in O2 or is it more a metabolic component?
But overall, the description is about as good as the kinds of descriptions we get in our media today…weak. Slimey? Did they mean that word “slimey” the way the media described the “melted metal” after the MacArthur Maze “meltdown” last week. It was not melted (slumped yes, melted no), of course.
And of course, I was thinking again about all the newly extinct creatures that preceded our modern biological perespective, the fossils of which have never been made or have yet to see the light of day again. Giant salamanders, huge lampreys and hagfish, gigantic sturgeon…gad’s zukes! Imagine how today’s media would cover that.

By: mystery_man

mystery_man — Fri, 11 May 2007 16:51:35 +0000

Dogu4- Always enjoy discussing these things with you. One more thing, I am not ruling out this reported creature as a salamander of some sort, I just wish I had a more accurate description of what it looked like and its behavior before saying for certain. For example, what color was it? How big were the “immense claws”? How big were the teeth and what shape were they? The article says the skin was “scaly”, is that an accurate observation? If so, this would point away from a salamander since they do not have scaly skin. When the article says it is ravenous and “chaws up” everything it comes into contact with, what do they mean by “everything”? I guess at the size mentioned, that could be a lot, and the description in some ways matches that of a giant salamander. They month it was caught was May, so I suppose it would not be in a letharigic winter mode. i also concede that the article did not explicitely say how big the teeth were, only that they were “saw like” which I suppose is somewhat accurate. Fascinating to speculate about and I wish we had been given more facts to go on here. I have the feeling the description provided is not very trustworthy nor entirely factual.

By: mystery_man

mystery_man — Fri, 11 May 2007 16:14:54 +0000

Dogu4- The teeth on giant salamanders are quite small and not very formidable, although I suppose on a ten foot long specimen with a little exaggeration thrown in, they could turn into something more impressive. Their teeth are not designed for tearing or shredding. I suppose salamanders could be pulled up in an agitated state but I have personally worked with Japanese Giant salamanders and I can tell you there is not the kind of violent aggression one gets the impression of from this article. Indeed when the water gets very cold during the winter months, these slamanders are very lethargic and slow moving.

I wrote a little on the other thread about Canadian “black alligators” concerning giant salamanders in Japan. They indeed do prefer cold, fast moving streams as this facilitates the absorbtion of oxygen through the skin. However, they are still cold blooded animals and will become very slow during colder months, lurking mostly motionless at the bottom. They are opportunist feeders that will eat what they can find, but mostly small animals such as crustaceans, worms, and small fish. They do not attack and take down large prey which is a common misperception, they are not aggressive, and they are harmless to humans.

By: dogu4

dogu4 — Fri, 11 May 2007 15:39:21 +0000

MysteryMan…Within the context of a newspaper account from those days, I can easily believe that it’s behaviour and description were “amped-up” a bit to instill a sense of excitement in the reader, remembering that the purpose of newspaper, like news on TV, is to “sell soap” and if we manage to tweeze out a bit of info, well, that’s just dandy and the first amendment is a nice piece of furniture behind which irresponsible reporters can conveniently hide.
The skull of the giant salamander over in the Bone Room at their website shows a nice row of teeth that would very much approximate a saw (small even teeth)…and that was from specimen considerably smaller that the 5′ record. A 10′ creature would of course scale up proportionally so that the teeth could be 4x the size of the largest 5′ specimen and become very prominent and effective on more than just the unfortunate crayfish. As to it’s behaviour, I’d take into consideration the fact that creatures pulled from their happy homes will be agitated beyond what one would normally expect and the small frogs and newts I’ve messed around with have a powerful ability to struggle when threatened. So I still favor the giant amphibian premise. I find it interesting that so many water-monster reports come from are bodies of water that linger in post-glacial forelands, Which during the past few hundred thousands of years, were until just lately, one of the largest and most wide-spread habitats on earth. Amphibians take up oxygen through their skin and so it’s worth recalling that contrary to our common sense which tells us that the warmer the water the more stuff that can dissolve in it, when it comes to oxygen and calcium carbonate, it’s the opposite, so while sometimes low in nutrients, cold glacial waters oferf lots of other stuff vital to big life-forms with slow metabolisms. What’s the evolutionary for thos Japanese giants? Glacial history?

By: mystery_man

mystery_man — Fri, 11 May 2007 14:57:21 +0000

The problem I have with the hellbender theory is the description of its aggressiveness, how it is “savage”, and the mention of “sharp teeth like a saw”. The hellbender is not an aggressive creature and is actually quite harmless to humans, as are the other types of giant salamanders. They mostly eat by sucking in their prey, which in the case of hellbenders consists of 90% crawfish. They do not attack and rip with sharp teeth, or “chaw” visciously on their prey, and in fact they do not have large fangs of any kind. I suppose the description is reminiscent of one, though, and there could be an undiscovered species that matches this description for aggressiveness and size. Since the hellbander is fully aquatic, it would explain why this creature was so loathe to leave the water.

By: dogu4

dogu4 — Fri, 11 May 2007 01:38:37 +0000

Yeah, imagine a species of hellbender adapted to the scale of the Missouri/Mississippi drainage. I’d bet humans would find that irresistible and they’d quickly go like the giant sturgeons of eurasia, long before a modern literate observer witnesses any. What a wild world it was.

By: ndiandy

ndiandy — Thu, 10 May 2007 21:02:31 +0000

Sounds to me like an extremely large Hellbender salamander. The salamanders I have seen and owned (not hellbenders) were ravenous, could emit a “barking” noise, had claws and slimy wrinkly skin. An extra large hellbender might fit the description in the article.

By: captiannemo

captiannemo — Thu, 10 May 2007 19:51:06 +0000

Maybe the flooding will flush the beasties from out of their lair.