By Bob Davidsson
Although the Lake Worth Lagoon's mysterious "Muck Monster" has never been identified, the legend is worth its weight in gold to the local tourism industry in Palm Beach County.
The Muck Monster is everywhere. It has a Facebook page. Its video is on YouTube. You can find it on Twitter. It has a Wiki. There is even a Muck Monster impersonator in the Palm Beaches.
The popularity of the Muck Monster rivals the elusive "Everglades Skunk Ape" as the favorite Florida research topic of crypto-scientists worldwide.
It was marketed on Palm Beach County's official "Discover the Palm Beaches" promotional advertisements with a provocative and alluring slogan daring visitors "to conduct their own search" for the legendary monster. Viewing stations were actually set up for tourists along the Lake Worth Lagoon to search for the beast.
The sea monster has the unusual distinction of honorary citizenship in the City of West Palm Beach. This official action was taken by the City Commission in September 2009.
The "AmericanMonsters.com" website reported, "A mysterious serpentine creature was captured by shocked eyewitnesses on videotape as it slithered just beneath the surface in Florida's Lake Worth Lagoon. Once the (video) footage was released, it created one of most intense 'monster frenzies' in U.S. history."
Fact Check:
A team from Lagoon Keepers, a nonprofit organization dedicated to cleaning and maintaining the quality of the Lake Worth Lagoon, responded to a report of a log floating in the waterway's channel. As Greg Reynolds and Dan Serrano approached Channel Marker 10 in August 2009, they observed unusual rippling and a wake created by a shadowy 10-foot long animal of unknown origin.
The event was recorded on a video camera which briefly revealed the tail fin of the creature. The video was uploaded onto the Internet, and in a matter of days, the Muck Monster went "viral" with more than four million views. A legend was born.
The Muck Monster became a reality TV star when the History Channel featured the creature in an episode of its "Monster Quest" series. The producers of the show hired a diving team to hunt for the monster. Their murky underwater video revealed nothing more than a few fish in the silt-filled waters of the Lake Worth Lagoon.
Crypto-scientists and wildlife officials interviewed for the "Monster Quest" episode suggested the monster could be a lost harbor seal from the northeast, or a Caribbean monk seal, also known as a "sea wolf". Another popular theory is the Muck Monster is actually a Florida manatee with a cut in its tail fin caused by a boat propeller.
Fact Check:
The last confirmed sighting of a Caribbean monk seal was 1952 off the coast of Jamaica. The species was declared extinct in 2008 by the National Marine Fisheries Service after an extensive five-year search. The most recent Florida sighting was 1922, when a seal was killed near Key West.
Caribbean monk seals obtained a length of eight feet with males weighing up to 600 pounds. Algae growth on the fur of the seals often gave them an eerie greenish appearance.
Monk seals were once found throughout the Caribbean, Gulf of Mexico and southeastern Atlantic coast. They occasionally visited the coast of Florida to hunt for mollusks in lagoons and shallow reefs.
Today, the Muck Monster is part of a strange fraternity of aquatic creatures. "SeaMonsters.org: A Who's Who of Lake and Sea Monsters" features the Muck Monster video in its index, where it joins such aquatic celebrities as the "Loch Ness Monster" and "Champ," a monster lurking in New York's Lake Champlain.
Legendary movie director John Ford once said, "When the truth conflicts with the myth, film the legend." The legend of the Muck Monster lives, and Palm Beach County profits from it.
(c.) Revised 2015.
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