Newly Surfaced Video Supports Loch Ness ‘Eel’ Theory

The Loch Ness is viewed in March 2012. Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images

The theory that the legendary Loch Ness Monster might be a large eel was boosted after a video posted on social media showed what appears to be an eel in the River Ness.

The Ness Fishery Board, a U.K. statutory body, tweeted the video. The Ness Fishery Board is “a statutory body responsible for the protection and enhancement of salmon and sea trout fisheries in the Ness District” in Scotland, according to its website.

“Lets be honest - when you see a large, eel-shaped object passing your camera in the River Ness, the first thing you think of is #lochnessmonster,” the government organization wrote.

The Times of London reported on the video on Wednesday, Sept. 18. The video was posted on Sept. 1.

The River Ness is a river that flows from the northern end of the Loch Ness into Inverness.

The Fishery Board posted the clip just days before New Zealand researcher Neil Gemmell announced in a press conference that there is a possibility that the monster, named “Nessie,” is a giant eel.

He said that it’s not likely that Nessie is a dinosaur, as it has been theorized in the past.

Loch Ness, Scotland Google Maps

“We can’t find any evidence of a creature that’s remotely related to that in our environmental-DNA sequence data,” Gemmell said, reported the BBC. “So, sorry, I don’t think the plesiosaur idea holds up based on the data that we have obtained.”

“There is a very significant amount of eel DNA,” Gemmell, who is a geneticist from New Zealand’s University of Otago, added to the broadcaster.

“Eels are very plentiful in Loch Ness, with eel DNA found at pretty much every location sampled–there are a lot of them. So, are they giant eels? Well, our data doesn’t reveal their size, but the sheer quantity of the material says that we can’t discount the possibility that there may be giant eels in Loch Ness,” he added.

A view of the Loch Ness Monster, near Inverness, Scotland, April 19, 1934. The photograph, one of two pictures known as the 'surgeon's photographs,' was allegedly taken by Colonel Robert Kenneth Wilson, though it was later exposed as a hoax by one of the participants, Chris Spurling, who, on his deathbed, revealed that the pictures were staged by himself, Marmaduke and Ian Wetherell, and Wilson. References to a monster in Loch Ness date back to St. Columba's biography in 565 AD. More than 1,000 people claim to have seen 'Nessie' and the area is, consequently, a popular tourist attraction. Photo by Keystone/Getty Images

Then he concluded that there is a “possibility that what people see and believe is the Loch Ness monster might be a giant eel.”

The very first sighting of the Loch Ness monster was reported in the 6th century when St. Columbia “gave an order to one of his monks to swim across the lake to get a boat,” says the Vintage News.

However, the Irish saint told the monster to stop and not touch the monk and return to the bottom of the Loch Ness. The monster then complied.