Kendra Luckow is used to finding creatures at Race Rocks, but her recent discovery leaves her perplexed.

She works as an “ecokeeper,” formerly known as a lighthouse keeper, in the Race Rocks Marine Protected Area off the southern tip of Vancouver Island.

“I’m on a rock in the middle of the ocean,” she said.

Every day, seagulls and other birds have many surprises in store for him, from crustaceans to starfish. But while out for a walk Oct. 26, Luckow stopped and looked at something different: an animal with dozens of teeth.

“I’ve never seen so many teeth on an animal, ever,” she told Glacier Media. “It’s probably up there as far as weird things go.”

Taking a bunch of photos, she shared images of the creature on Facebook and with colleagues trying to determine what it was.

His social media post in the Field Naturalists of Vancouver Island group garnered more than 200 comments from people giving their opinions on what they think of the animal.

“I think it’s definitely a fish, given the rows of teeth,” Luckow said.

Many people have suggested that the animal was a lingcod; one person even said it “looks like the Alien.”

Maria Cornthwaite, head of the groundfish data unit at Fisheries and Oceans Canada, said the image, which shows teeth and a shriveled body, makes it impossible to say for sure what it is.

“I think this one would be difficult even if we had the specimen, because it didn’t look like there was much left of the head or body,” Cornthwaite said.

Examining the teeth, she said it could be a ghostly grenadier – a group of deep-sea fish with rat-like tails that Cornthwaite has sometimes seen during research surveys off the coast. coastal British Columbia.

The specimen could be either a ghostly grenadier or a rough abyssal grenadier (Coryphaenoides yaquinae or C. leptolepis), she said. Fish usually have bands of teeth rather than two distinct rows.

As for Luckow, she enjoyed seeing everyone try to guess what scary animal had stumbled into her life, and she is grateful to the teaching staff and volunteers at Pearson College in Metchosin who raised money to keep a guardian on the ‘island.

Without them, Luckow said, she wouldn’t be “out here looking for scary skeletons.”