re: Japanese plesiosaur

[kabe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Katsumi Abe)]

The Japanese 'plesiosaur' was collected 30 miles off Christchurch in the
morning of April 25th, 1977.  It was reported after 3 months later when the
fishing boat returned to Japan.  The crew discarded it because of the
terrible smell of decaying.  We have only a few photos of the nearly whole
body (it looks like a plesiosaur indeed) and a single bristle (I don't know
the proper term) from the fin.  Later a scientist reported biochemical
similarity to a certain shark based on the composition ratio of amino acids
in the bristle.


Katsumi Abe
                          Shizuoka University
                          Life and Earth Sciences
                          Oya 836, Shizuoka 422, Japan
                          e-mail: kabe@sci.shizuoka.ac.jp
                          fax: 81-(0)54-238-0491
                          tel: 81-(0)54-238-4800