Scotland’s legendary Loch Ness monster may just be a giant eel, according to a newly published study.
Loch Ness is a deep and extremely large freshwater lake in Scotland, with an area of up to 56km 2 . There is more water inside the lake than all the lakes in England and Wales combined.
But more importantly, it’s home to one of history’s most controversial sea monster myths: the Loch Ness Monster. The controversy is because although no one knows if there are water monsters in the lake, over the years thousands of people have claimed to have seen Nessie (the name given to it by humans). There is even evidence such as photos, videos… for sure.
According to the Straits Times, scientists said this on September 5 after carefully analyzing traces of DNA in the icy waters of Loch Ness.
Professor Neil Gemmell, a geneticist from New Zealand’s University of Otago, said the analysis did not suggest the existence of large animals such as dinosaurs in the lake.
However, according to Mr. Gemmell, there is a lot of eel DNA in Loch.
“There are a lot of eels in the lake, each of our sampling sites has quite a few eels. And their mass is a bit surprising,” Mr. Gemmell said.
According to a newly published study, most likely the Loch Ness monster is just a giant eel. (Photo: Straits Times).
“We don’t rule out the possibility that there is a giant eel in Loch Ness. But we don’t know if the samples (DNA) we collected were from a giant eel or just a normal sized one. . There’s still a lot we don’t know.”
Professor Gemmell notes that although there are theories about a giant eel that has lived for decades, no one has yet caught it in Loch Ness.
An international team of scientists from the UK, Denmark, the US, Australia and France took DNA samples from Loch last June.
DNA sampling has been used as a tool to track aquatic creatures such as whales and sharks. Whenever an organism moves through its environment, it leaves behind tiny bits of DNA from skin, scales, feathers, feces, and urine.
Professor Neil Gemmell took samples on his boat to study the DNA of the Loch Ness monster in June 2018. (Photo: AFP).
These DNA samples can be collected and analyzed to determine which organism belongs to based on comparison with a large database of DNA from hundreds of thousands of different organisms.
The first record of the Loch Ness monster appears in the 6th century when the Irish monk St Columba is said to have chased the monster to the bottom of the lake.
Over the years, many people have tried to track down the monster but failed.
Most recently, 3 years ago, a high-tech drone detected a monster but it was not exactly what was recorded.
The replica of this monster was used for the 1970 movie – The Private Life Of Sherlock Holmes.