Yep, this is insane.
According to the Lexington Herald-Leader, a number of beachgoers at the Outer Banks in North Carolina were left in awe after witnessing a strange nature phenomena on October 14th.
And I’m talking about fish flinging themselves out of the water and landing on the beach at Ocracoke Island.
Video footage shows fish by the thousands tumbling over each other as they all collect on the beach.
Dubbed the “bluefish blitz,” it resulted in thousands of beached fish dying as they piled up on the sand.
The Outer Banks based Tradewinds Tackle fishing store stated that:
“Bluefish have been blitzing the Ocracoke beach off and on the past couple of weeks.
Amazingly beautiful and tragic at the same time. Smaller fish (mostly spot in these photos) are literally throwing themselves onshore to escape the teeth in the water…. Bluefish have lots of teeth and will kill anything they catch.”
Some video footage shows much larger bluefish swimming and eating the smaller bluefish before they make it to the shore.
Marybeth Druzbick of Sylva, North Carolina was visiting South Point on Ocracoke Island, and witnessed the whole wild ordeal.
She wrote:
“This is one of the strangest things I’ve seen at the beach!”
“Bluefish blitzes” happen the same time with southern migration of bluefish, which are cannibalistic and aren’t afraid to snap at people.
Fishing Status reports that:
“Bluefish are extremely aggressive, and will often chase bait through the surf zone, and literally onto dry beach.
Thousands of big bluefish will attack schools of hapless baitfish in mere inches of water, churning the water like a washing machine…. Bait fish, such as bunker, will willingly run themselves high and dry on the sand, where they will suffocate, rather than be shredded by the marauding bluefish schools.”
