Mysterious 'alien-like' creature confounds locals after washing up on Aussie beach

Queensland man Alex Tan was stunned to come across the remains while walking on Maroochydore Beach on the Sunshine Coast, about 100km north of Brisbane. He said he came across creature this week not long after floods hit the area.

"I've stumbled across something weird," he said in a post on Instagram. "This is like one of those things you see when people claim they've found aliens."

The as-yet-unidentified creature has four limbs, a reptile-like skull and a tail.

People responding to Mr Tan's post suggested the remains might be those of a baby kangaroo or a wallaby. Mr Tan said at first he thought it was a possum but conceded he was unsure.

"I'm excited to hear what it would be," he told the news.com.au website.

Beachgoers in California were stunned in May last year when a jet-black creature with a gaping underbite, spikey teeth and a tentacle-covered appendage and bulb protruding from its head, washed up on the shore in San Diego.

But scientists at the city's Institution of Oceanography University soon identified it as a Pacific football fish, a deep-sea dweller.

Pacific football fishes are so rare that only 31 specimens have been found in more than a century since the creature was first discovered.

They are a species of anglerfish that normally live at depths of more than 3,000ft.