Unexpected finds made in blue marlin caught during NC tournament, scientists say

The winning fish caught during North Carolina’s Big Rock Blue Marlin Tournament are proving to be full of surprises for researchers tasked with sampling the carcasses.

This includes not just stomach contents, but evidence of meals that didn’t go down without a fight, according to the N.C. State Center for Marine Sciences and Technology.

The annual tournament is based in Morehead City, and concluded in June with a marlin weighing 919.9 pounds.

“What is the strangest thing you’ve found sampling a blue marlin? The resounding answer from the sampling team was a bill from a billfish that was found inside the winning marlin’s head,” center officials reported in a July 9 news release.

“It must have had a liking for eating billfish, because it also had two more in its stomach!”

A portable x-ray machine was used to figure out “how the bill lodged in the head.” It revealed the bony spike had likely been stuck there for two months, and the wound was healing around it, officials said.

“Researchers don’t yet know the species of the billfish but since there was still tissue on the bone of the bill, they are hoping to do some genetic testing to determine the species,” CMAST said.

Testing of stomach contents in years past has also revealed the winning marlin ate mackerel, dolphinfish, papered nautilus and a wahoo, the center says.

The center has partnered with the tournament for 24 years, collecting samples that are shared with labs studying billfish across the country, including Stanford University, Texas A&M University and the NOAA Southeast Fisheries Science Center, officials said.

Among the parts sampled: intestines, muscles, liver, intestines, blood and “the whole eye of each marlin,” CMAST says.

Blue marlin can reach 14 feet in length and 2,000 pounds, and they migrate seasonally along the coast to stay in warm waters, according to the N.C. Department of Environmental Quality.