A local seafood stall has lucked out with an unusually monstrous catch—a massive 12-foot-long eel so large, it took two grown men to hold up.
Posted Monday in a Facebook group called “Hong Kong market seafood research,” the photo showed the shiny, gargantuan eel in a stall at a market in Mei Foo.
HK01 reported that the eel—identified as a moray eel, a common fishermen’s catch in Hong Kong—weighed around 15kg, and was about six times as long as a typical moray eel.
A stallkeeper said an eel of this size is extremely rare, and explained that it was caught by a fisherman using a small bait, not a fishing trap—making the catch even more extraordinary.
On Facebook, the picture of the eel attracted over 200 comments, with many netizens remarking on its appearance.
“Its head looks like a dragon,” one person wrote.
Another joked that the pictured creature is not an eel, but in fact, a prehistoric animal.
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At the stall, the eel was divvied up into small pieces and sold at around HK$100 (US$13) for a catty, the equivalent of around 600 grams.
The rare catch drew flocks of curious market shoppers to the stall asking how the eel should be cooked. (According to the stallkeeper, the eel can be best prepared in a stew or grilled.)
By mid-afternoon, most of the eel had been snapped up, with just a third of it remaining, Apple Daily reported.
