‘King of herrings’ is one of ocean’s longest fish and can grow to eight metres long, living at depths up to 500m in the open sea

At first it looked like a great silver streak on the sand. An oarfish, fantastically long and rarely seen, had washed up on Tasmania’s rugged west coast.

Oarfish, one of the ocean’s longest fish, are astonishing creatures that grow up to eight metres long. Nicknamed the “king of herrings” or more unkindly the “doomsday fish”, some legends and stories consider the animals to be harbingers of disaster.