Fisherman recovers giant squid off Matagorda coast

MATAGORDA, Texas (KTRK) -- A rare find for a young, experienced fisherman proves exciting for researchers across the country.

Michael Belvin, 25, and his friends were returning from a fishing trip on Sunday when something caught their eye in the water.

"It looked like a white trash bag in the water," said Belvin. "We pulled it up and it was a giant squid."

It took two grown men about three minutes to hoist the 10-foot, 200-pound squid onto their boat deck.

"It's crazy what's out there in the ocean with you," said Belvin.

The squid was already dead when the men found it about 100 miles off the coast of Matagorda.

"It's exciting to find a giant squid off the coast here," said Houston Zoo Aquarium Supervisor Mike Concannon.

Marine biologists know very little about giant squid because they're deep water animals that almost never travel into shallow water unless they're in trouble.

"So this might have been a sick animal that was going toward the surface and got attacked," said Concannon.

"It looked like a mako shark bit it, the way the jagged teeth were on the back side of it," said Belvin. "It was missing about half of its body."

Giant squid have eight arms and two feeding tentacles. They can grow up to 43 feet and have the largest eyes of the whole animal kingdom.

"It (felt) pretty soft but a lot thicker than any other squid," said Belvin.

While his ice chest was full of fish from his trip, Belvin said, this was the greatest find of them all.

"It's insane. Huge! And pretty cool," he said.