A grapefruit-sized eyeball has washed up on a beach in the US, leaving scientists baffled about exactly where - and what - it came from.
The big blue eyeball was found by local man Gino Covacci on Pompano Beach, north of Fort Lauderdale, on Wednesday.
Wildlife officials are still trying to determine its origins and have been put it on ice so it can be analysed at the Florida Fish and Wildlife Research Institute in St Petersburg.
Mr Covacci told Florida newspaper Sun Sentinel that he kicked the stange object along the beach when he first saw it, until he realised what it was.
'It was very, very fresh,' he said. 'It was still bleeding when I put it in the plastic bag.'
Mr Covacci said he took it home and put it in the fridge.
Florida Fish and Wildlife Research Institute believe the eyeball probably came from a marine animal, since it was found on a beach.
At first, possible candidates included a giant squid, a whale or some type of large fish.
But spokesman for the institute Kevin Baxter told Sky News Online that bone has been found around the eyeball.
He says this means the eyeball is not from an invertebrate, which are animals that do not have backbones, such as squid.
'Because it's got bone we believe it is some kind of large fish,' he said.
Photo courtesy of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Research Institute.
