It wasn't raining cats and dogs at a California golf course on
Monday - it was raining sharks.
A live leopard shark was discovered thrashing about on the grass at
around 4pm at the San Juan Hills golf club in San Juan Capistrano,
which is four miles from the coast.
The sea creature was spotted by a startled golf club marshall near
the 12th tee box, where a group of golfers had just been
playing.
'Shark falling from the sky, kind of odd,' said Melissa
McCormack, director of club operations at San Juan Hills.
Ms McCormack believes the two-foot-long shark may have been scooped
out of the ocean by a predatory bird and dropped onto the golf
course.
The creature had two puncture wounds near its dorsal fin and was
covered in blood when it was found.
The staffer who came upon the shark picked it up, put it in the
back of his golf cart and drove it to the clubhouse.
'It was just wriggling around. He needed to get to the ocean right
away,' Ms McCormack told The Despatch. 'Honestly, this is the
weirdest thing that's happened here.'
She and the marshall, Bryan Stizer, gave the shark a quick dip
in a bucket of fresh water and salt, as they weren't sure if the
fish would survive if placed in a tank of fresh water.
They then drove the shark out to the nearby ocean.
Still alive, the shark was dropped back into the sea at Baby Beach
near Dana Point.
'I thought he was dead,' Mr Stizer told The Dispatch.
'When I dropped him into the water, he just lied (sic) there for a
few seconds, but then he did a twist and shot off into the
water.'
Leopard sharks, which are light bright in colour with black spots,
are a common species in ocean waters around San Juan
Capistrano.