A fantasy author (Larry Niven?) wrote a story showing that sea serpents
became extinct as a result of competition from whalers for their favorite
prey. That would explain all those early sightings, including some by
scientists, never to be repeated reliably in later years. ;->
 
When I was compiling literature for my doctoral thesis on San Clemente
Basin (a deep-sea basin west of San Diego, California), I found several
references to sea serpents there. The fishermen called it the "San Clemente
Monster," and no, they were not referring to Richard Nixon! Well, I knew
that sea monsters were real enough. As soon as a sea monster is caught in a
net or washes up on the beach, it's given a proper scientific name and is
removed from the realm of myth. The giant squid Architeuthis was originally
called a sea monster, for instance. So I carefully looked at all of my
trawled samples for evidence of sea-monster skeletal parts. I found
seastars, brittlestars, and whole herds of walking sea-cucumbers ("sea
pigs"), but no whale or dolphin bones, let alone sea monster parts. Whales
had dived under the ship while we were working, and no sea monsters had
shown up. I saw the green flash at sunset, but no sea monsters. Dolphins
played at the prow, still no sea monsters. Despite the lack of hard
evidence, I wrote up my speculations on the San Clemente Monster in the
draft of my thesis, partly to see if my committee members were paying
attention. No less than 3 out of 5 did notice and said that the San
Clemente Monster had to go! None of them found the typo in which I
substituted a "v" for a "c" in "vulcanism", so I suppose that they didn't
read every word of my thesis. After incorporating all their suggestions,
the thesis doubled in length and had to be bound in two volumes. The
Graduate School didn't require extra payment for binding; as the secretary
put it, "It usually isn't the student's fault."
 
I don't suppose that this is the last word on sea serpents and extinction.
Considering the number of hours that shell collectors spend on the water,
I'd be surprised if none of you have a story about sea monsters to tell.
So, has any of you Conchlers ever sighted a sea monster?
 
Andrew K. Rindsberg
Geological Survey of Alabama