Posted on 03/07/2006 4:35:43 PM PST by wjersey
PARIS
Divers have discovered a new crustacean in the South Pacific that resembles a lobster and is covered with what looks like silky, blonde fur, French researchers said Tuesday.
Scientists said the animal, which they named Kiwa hirsuta, was so distinct from other species that they created a new genus and new family for it.
A team of American-led divers found the animal in waters 7,540 feet deep at a site 900 miles south of Easter Island last year, according to Michel Segonzac of the French Institute for Sea Exploration, or IFREMER.
The new crustacean is described in the journal of the National Museum of Natural History in Paris. The animal is white and 5.9 inches long, about the size of a salad plate.
In what Segonzac described as a "surprising characteristic," the animal's pincers are covered with sinuous, hair-like strands. The diving expedition was organized by Robert Vrijenhoek of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in California.
They should have called it Kiwa hirsuta elvis.
And what are those things, claws or fortune cookies?
Odd looking but most marine life of the very deep are odd looking.
Depends how you cook it!
"The ortolan."
There's a scene in the movie "Gigi" in which Gigi's great-aunt teaches her how to eat.....ortolan. The French eat some odd things, that's for sure.
Head cheese?!?!? You dont know what youre missing!
Yes, I read that previously and nearly posted it. As for head cheese, I only feigned ignorance. I've eaten it and it ain't bad but, like blood sausage, you don't want to think too much about it.
I wonder if some kind of sparrow could be marketed as New World Ortolan to the same people who buy foie gras in cans...
Where I lived the snails were miserable pests in the garden. I always threatened to take in a bunch of French foreign exchange students if only they'd harvest and eat my escargot. Most snails here on the West Coast are actually European brown snails. They were imported originally for culinary use but escaped and are now a scourge. Eat More Snails!
,,, yeee-ha! And I've been shaking my moneymaker to raise taxi fares home without it!
,,, at last, a reason to use a salad plate. Good for the French, finding this creature. It may be something to replace all the sealife they've killed with their south Pacific nuclear testing over the years.
It probably didn't exist before the tests. It may have been a seagull....or a snorkeling tourist!
'Does look rather yummy though. It may make a tasty side dish to all those crunchy Orcs we've been eating.
,,, I'm all for a bit on the side Muttly! A would be lobster in a fur coat - gotta have one.
Oh...I thought it was a yellow monkey with a helmet.
Nevermind.
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