The organs of 1,323 pound, 12 foot long mako shark legally caught by recreational fishermen were donated to NOAA Fisheries where shark scientists dissecting them found a big surprise: a 200 pound sea lion in the shark's stomach.
Antonella Preti, a shark biologist with the NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center, was charged with dissecting the mako shark's organs. Preti has worked on stomach analysis for more than 15 years, dissecting more than 2,000 swordfish and shark stomachs.
"This is the biggest one I've ever dissected" she said, adding that the stomach came from "possibly the largest mako shark that was ever caught."
Mako sharks are opportunistic apex predators that usually eat a variety of fish, squid, small marine mammals and seabirds. But a fully grown mako is capable of taking down large marine mammals like adult seals and sea lions.
The huge mako shark's stomach lining resembles a large blanket and easily contained the whole, partially digested sea lion. According to NOAA Fisheries, the sharks will regurgitate the bones and skull of large prey like sea lions after all the muscle and soft tissue is digested.
When the giant mako was caught in June off the coast of Southern California, it generated both headlines and criticism.
According to the New York Daily News, the fish was caught legally during a commercial fishing trip that took place in tandem with the filming of a big game-hunting reality TV series called "Jim Shockey's The Professionals" for the Outdoor Channel.
The mako was caught in waters known to be nursery ground for mako sharks, but Nick Wegner, a fisheries research biologist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego, said makos caught in those waters are usually between 2.5 and 6 feet long.
"Seeing a fish over 1,000 pounds -- whether it's a shark, a tuna or a billfish -- it's extremely rare," said Jack Vitek, world records coordinator for the Florida-based International Game Fish Association.
David McGuire, director of the California-based protection advocacy group Shark Stewards, said he was "shocked" by the news.
"People should be viewing these sharks as wonderful animals that are important to the ocean and admiring how beautiful they are" rather than "spilling their blood and guts," McGuire told the Los Angeles Times.
"These kind of reality shows are not reality," he said. "The reality is we're overfishing sharks and this macho big-game attitude should be a relic of the past."