A “mystery specimen” was found at Clearwater Beach earlier this year has been determined to be the jaw of a very large Parrotfish.

The most recent Bermuda Zoological Society newsletter said, “A mystery specimen was found by snorkelers as they approached the beach at Clearwater earlier this year.

Photo courtesy of BAMZ Image Collection

“At first glance their find was thought to be from the mouth of a fish that grinds its food – an eagle ray perhaps?

“However, Nigel Pollard, captain of the Endurance, pointed out that the rows of grinding structures in the mouth of an eagle ray are more like linear or chevron-shaped plates, and those of our mystery specimen are individual rounded structures.

“To answer the question of what our specimen is, we turned to a colleague at the Florida Museum of Natural History who told us that our, “Specimen is from a very large Parrotfish [Family - Scaridae].

“The element is the lower pharyngeal grinder [jaw], but, unfortunately, without comparing our specimen, physically, with his reference specimens, he wasn’t able to identify it to genus and species.