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Giant squid becomes feast for shark off Australian coast

Al McGlashan found the deceased mysterious creature and while filming it a shark swam up looking for a meal

Rare footage of a blue shark chowing down on a giant squid carcass off the coast of Australia is going viral.

The Daily Telegraph fishing columnist Al McGlashan found the remains of the squid about 50 km off Jervis Bay. The squid had recently died because it was still ruby red in colour. The carcass was about three metres long without most if its tentacles which had been bitten off. While filming the carcass, a 2.5-metre long blue shark appeared and began its feast.

"It must have died not that long before we found it because it didn't smell at all and its colours were still strong," said McGlashan in a News.com.au article. "Most giant squid remains are smelly and rotten and just off-white by the time someone finds them."

Australian Museum squid specialist Mandy Reid told the outlet the animals can be as large as 13 metres and this one either just came to the end of its life or lost a fight to the death with a sperm whale, its only known predator.

"It hoed into the squid straight away and didn't care a bit that it was right next to us," McGlashan told the outlet. "It goes to show not much goes to waste in the natural world. Everything gets recycled somehow."

While the shark got the best of the squid in this case, it was a squid (not a giant one) that came out on top in a brief battle with a seagull near Victoria, B.C recently.