Rare 134-kg giant Spanish mackerel caught off Shandong coast, drawing crowds and online buzz

A fishing boat returning from waters off Taoluo Town in Donggang District, Rizhao, East China's Shandong Province, arrived at the port on Sunday with a rare giant Spanish mackerel weighing 134 kilograms, drawing a crowd at the fishing port, according to the Dazhong Daily, a local media outlet in Shandong.

The fish measured 2.46 meters in length and weighed 134 kilograms, according to measurements taken at the port.

Veteran fishermen called the catch a rare sight. Wang Weijun, a veteran fisherman with years of experience at sea, said Spanish mackerel caught in coastal waters typically weigh several kilograms to a few dozen kilograms.

A giant weighing more than 100 kilograms would need to grow naturally in the clean waters of the Yellow Sea for more than a decade, he said.

The fish belongs to a type locally known as bian ba (flat-bodied Spanish mackerel), also nicknamed "short-necked mackerel" by local residents. These large fish require excellent water quality, a healthy marine ecosystem and abundant food resources. Very few survive and grow to such a size before successfully completing their migratory journeys, making them a rare and prized catch that is seldom seen in coastal waters, Wang said.

The catch also sparked jokes on social media, with some netizens quipping that a giant Spanish mackerel like this could win over any father-in-law in Shandong.

The joke draws on a local tradition in Shandong of giving fresh Spanish mackerel to elders, particularly fathers-in-law, in spring. The bigger the fish, the better the gift is generally considered to be. A mackerel this huge, netizens joked, would surely make even the most hard-to-please father-in-law beam with delight.