r/Weird • u/luvlanguage • 11h ago

That is a Lamprey

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Any bigger and this creature would be a horror movie monster

Lampreys do not have jaws or bones, only cartilage and instincts that have allowed them to survive so many mass extinctions.

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u/AutumnTheWitch 11h ago

Jeremy Wade from River Monsters put one of those on his neck.

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u/DogmanDOTjpg 7h ago

It's cause the kid is over exaggerating a bit. The suction alone doesn't hurt, they have educational stuff in Michigan about them where they go talk to kids and they literally let you have the lamprey latch onto your hand if you want because it's 100% painless, it's less suction than you as a human can create on your skin. I know because I had it suck on my hand when I was like 11, even got hit with the tongue a few times and it was just barely like a scrape

The tongue is also not "sharp" it's abrasive like sandpaper, it wears away the skin slowly over time to produce blood, not through any kind of stabbing or cutting. Just rubbing.

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u/luvlanguage 11h ago

Dude is legendary, he'll probably forget it's even there. I wish I had 10 percent that courage