The Great Brine Shrimp, Old Briney, or Briney the Brine Shrimp is a purported cryptid and lake monster which dwells in Utah's Great Salt Lake. The monster is one of three major monsters that have been attributed to the Salt Lake, the others being the North Shore Monster and the Great Salt Lake Whales. These other monsters are sometimes explained as misidentifications of Briney, whose fish-like tail and scaled body match the descriptions of these other two creatures.
Artemia franciscana, the primary species of brine shrimp that inhabit the Great Salt Lake of Utah. Only these and the nymphs of brine flies can live in the lake's high salinity.
Description[]
The Great Brine Shrimp looks like a horrifically enlarged version of the lake's only native aquatic species, artemia franciscana. Like the local brine shrimp, it is able to withstand the high salinity of the lake. Attributions of its size vary wildly, with the lower end being around the size of a porpoise (5 feet), and the upper end being that of a whale (over 50 feet). It is described as having a long, scaled body in similar shape to a dolphin, and sometimes having wing-like fins or paddles on the sides of its body.
Another strange attribute attributed to the creature are tusk-like appendages on its face. In 1870, fishermen on the Utah lake found part of a bizarre tusked skull that could not be identified. The description of the strange piece led both Salt Lake locals to claim it must have been a remnant from their own lake monster, swimming between Utah Lake and Salt Lake via the Jordan River. These "tusks" have also been linked to Salt Lake monster's purported similarity to the nearby Bear Lake Monster, who is sometimes described as having a head like a walrus.
Sightings of "dolphin-like" and "tusked" creatures in the Salt Lake is part of why the Great Brine shrimp is sometimes theorized to be a modern descendant of a Cambrian radiodont, such as anomalocaris canadensis. Utah was covered by shallow sea during the paleozoic period, and that water has slowly receded over time, becoming the massive Lake Bonneville, and eventually receding into Utah's present lakes. Fossils of Cambrian species, including anomalocaris, can be found throughout the state as remnants of its underwater history. Anomalocaris also bares a striking resemblence to the brine shrimp of the lake.
Behavior[]
The Great Brine Shrimp is primarily aquatic in nature, with a dolphin-like form, and it is recorded to be an excellent swimmer. Some accounts claim it to be partly amphibious, able to emerge from the water and walk, crawl, or galumph onto shore (see 1877 and 1903 accounts). This suggests the presence of legs of some kind, in addition to its aquatic fins.
A very strange behavior from the 1903 Stansbury account the creature's power of flight. This may mean that Old Briney participates in some form of breaching behavior, similar to a whale or dolphin. Thin, membane-like fins could also allow Briney to glide over long distances after breach, in a manner similar to a flying fish.
Accounts of Old Briney attribute its diet to consist primarily of the local brine shrimp. The 1903 stansbury account states that the monster they saw would dive in and out of the lake to feast on these shrimp. Their account also noted that the creature captured and ate a horse, however, so it seems that predation is also a behavior that Old Briney can adopt if food is scarce or circumstance allows. As a result, the Great Brine Shrimp is also likely to feed on migratory sea birds when necesarry.
Several accounts of Salt Lake's monster detail large, powerful eyes. These are often described as being lidless, unblinking, and glowing or shining. This would match the compound eyes found on both brine shrimp and anomalocaris. The 1903 account also lists the monster as depending on its accute eyesight for hunting.
Old Briney is reported to have several means of defense, notably thick armor and the ability to change color. One account claims that in addition to thick scales, the monster's body was encrusted with a thick coating of salt, which provided enough armor to deflect bullets. Accounts also describe scintillating or changing colors, making the monster hard to look at or discern the shape of. This could be used either as a means of camoflauge or distraction to avoid danger.
Origins[]
With the arrival of pioneers in the 1840's, natives warned the settlers of dangerous mermaid-like creatures called Water Babies that lived in the Salt Lake, who would lure people to the water's edge only to drown them. During the first Mormon expedition of the lake in April of 1848, an explorer named Brother Bainbridge saw what he thought to be a large fish, porpoise, or dolphin-bodied creature and the far south side of the lake. To commemorate the sighting, the expedition team called the nearby island "Porpoise Island", although it would soon be renamed to Antelope island.
The most famous monster sighting of the lake was in 1877 near Monument Point (at the far North shore of the lake). Workers at the Barnes and Co. saltworks claimed to have encountered a large creature, which let out a loud bellow as it approached the shore, prompting the men to flee. The men were so frightened that they "hardly knew what they were doing [and] went back at once", and when questioned, they "[could] not give an intelligent description of it". According to witness J.H. McNeil (who signed an affidavit to affirm his account), the creature looked like "a crocodile or alligator... but much larger... It must have been seventy-five feet long". McNeil also mentions the head being very unlike a crocodile, and closer to that of a horse. Another witness, named Mr. Houghton, says all he saw was "two great, big eyes and a long tail". While the "Monument Point" sighting became the basis for the Salt Lake's other well known cryptid, the North Shore Monster, some have stated that this may have simply been a misidentification of a buffalo or even another lake cryptid, such as Old Briney.
Lake monster sightings abounded in Utah in the 1870's, beginning with the Bear Lake monster, which was followed by similar monsters in the Great Salt Lake and Utah Lake. Some even claimed that these were all the same creature, which moved between the different lakes using underground rivers. All three of these cryptids do share certain features, such as reptilian bodies and tusks. In the late 1880's, a story about a family of whales living in the Salt Lake also circulated, and the tale gained international fame. These were purported to being introduced into the lake from the Bear River Bay
Another important monster account comes from two hunters named Martin Gilbert and John Barry. In July of 1903the two men were exploring Stansbury Island when they saw a bizarre creature fly toward them, after which they tracked the beast and observed its behavior. According to their observations, the beast's "habits were doubtless aquatic". It had "the general contour of a dolphin", "the paddles of a whale", and a tail that "resembled that of a huge fish". It hunted by diving into the lake and "feeding upon the salt water shrimps which abound along the coast there". They also noted that "although of such gigantic size, there was nothing sluggish in the movements of the monster...it swam and dived as rapidly as any large fish". It was also described as being "encased with heavy horny scales", having jaws that "were very long" and "armed with immense serrated teeth", and having eyes that were "very large, round and burning with bright red light". They also noted that "the strong brine had no effect upon its eyes, which appeared lidless... evidently the animal’s food in the water was found by the sense of sight". The hunters also described wings that ran down the length of its body, "probably 100 feet" in length. Early illustrations depict it as a dragon or "a combination of fish, alligator, and bat". Details were hard for the hunters to confidently see, however, as it shimmered "like a brilliant rainbow folded into a compact mass" and its body was encrusted in a thick layer of salt which "completely hide the body". This salt armor even made the creature bullet-proof, deflecting shots fired from the hunters' rifles.
The story of the "Stansbury monster" was published by the Salt Lake Telegram, and many readers submitted opinions on the tale in the following days. The original study stated that the monster "is doubtless the last representative of a family whose other members, dead ages since, have left the testimony of their existence in the primeval rocks of the mountains". A reader referred to as "the learned J.I.C." responded to this claim by saying "the discovery of another [monster] in Great Salt lake is further evidence of the antiquity of that mysterious inland sea and proves that in the far-away paleozoic time it was part of the oceans... as we geologists know, the distinguishing characteristic of the paleozoic time was the extraordinary development of marine predators". A skeptical editor responded to this theory calling the J.I.C. gullible, and saying the hunters likely made the story up, comparing the "imaginative nimrods" story to those of Walt McDougall, an illustrator and writer who made strange animal stories for children. McDougall responded by basing one of his monster stories, the "hippodankus", loosely off of the hunter's tale. Another reader wrote to the Telegram "perhaps those two mighty hunters who discovered the What-Is-It on Stansbury island lost their spectacles and were looking through microscopes when they sighted the animal that swims and flies", insinuating that they may have mistaken the tiny local brine shrimp and/or brine flies for the monster. Indeed, it is important to note that these are the only known fauna that can survive the lake's harsh salinity. This tongue-in-cheek criticism that the monster sightings of Salt Lake were just large brine shrimp persisted as a local joke.
The idea of a giant brine shrimp monster in the lake finally solidified in 1973 when Mike Cassidy (a Salt Lake local and independent filmmaker) released (Attack of) The Giant Brine Shrimp. This spoof horror short film starred an oversized brine shrimp that terrorizes the Salt Lake area. The short gained extensive recognition and cult status among the locals, adding to the popular urban legend of giant brine shrimp in the lake. Today, fans of the monster stories claim that monster sightings on the Great Salt Lake can be blaimed on Old Briney, a giant brine shrimp creature based almost entirely on the Cassidy film. Some even claim that all monster sightings on the lake, even those attributed to unrelated cryptids, are simply misidentifications of this unseen arthropod.
In Media[]
The most obvious example of the great brine shrimp in media is the Mike Cassidy short film (Attack of) The Giant Brine Shrimp (1973). The plot begins with lake pollution mutating a brine shrimp to collosal size. It then goes on a rampage of chaos, with crimes including killing a couple participating in NCMO (non-commital make-out), burning the Saltair, terrorizing circus visitors, and toppling the Brigham Young Monument. The shrimp then climbs the Salt Lake Temple and prepares to topple the statue of Angel Moroni. The day is quickly saved, however, as a giant seagull appears and carries the monster off to its death. The film quickly gained local fame and popularity, owing to its humorous gags and impressive animation. The film was selected as the "Best Experimental Film" in the Mountains Region Film Contest of 1975, and it was one of the finalists in the 1975 nationwide Student Film Awards (sponsored by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences). The film was usually shown at local theaters or film festivals, but it was even aired on television for a short time in Bob Wilkins' Saturday Night Creature Features in 1976.
Tremors: The Series (2003) features an episode called Water Hazard in which desert brine shrimp are mutated by a chemical agent to become giant prehistoric shrimp called jurassic artemia. The story and monster were inspired by Cassidy's short film, and the original concept art of the monster was partly based off of anomalocaris canadensis, a common prehistoric species identified with Old Briney.
Environmental Factors[]
The Great Salt Lake is the largest saltwater lake in the Western Hemisphereand the eighth-largest terminal lake in the world. Its natural salinity averages around 12-15%, or about 3-4x the salinity of the ocean (the northern arm has roughly twice this salinity). These extreme conditions limit the types of life that can thrive in the lake; including brine shrimp, brine flies, nematodes, and several forms of algae. Carp and other fish species are able to survive in the freshwater wetlands and tributaries surrounding the lake, but not in the lake itself. As a result, a lake monster would need to have at least some similar adaptations or biological mechanisms to these species to survive.
The Salt Lake is also very shallow, with a maximum depth of 33 ft (±12 feet depending on yearly levels), and an average depth of 15 feet. This severely limits the likelihood of very large monsters successfully thriving, let alone hiding in the waters (a monster 50 ft long would likely have a height of 10 ft). It is important to note, however, that the lake has very poor visibility due to algal blooms, sediment, and other pollutants; so these factors could aid in hiding a large animal from view. If such a creature did live in the lake, it would seldom come near the shores, which have long mud shallows only a few feet deep.
Environmental Concerns[]
The Great Salt Lake is in a state of ecological crisis due to several factors, including artificial divisions, pollution, and receeding water levels. These factors have lead to large changes in the lake's ecosystem and properties when compared to its natural state.
The first major change is the artificial division of the lake into two seperate regions: the northern arm (AKA Gunnison Bay) and the southern arm (AKA Gilbert Bay). The lake was divided in the late 1950's in order to construct a raised railroad causeway across the lake. This causeway replaced the historic Lucin Cutoff (made in the early 1900's) that was previously used to bypass the lake. The original cutoff was a wooden tressle bridge, and allowed water to flow freely between both sides of the lake. The modern causeway is made of raised gravel and earth, preventing the flow of water or sollutes. Problematically, the south arm has all 3 of the lakes inlets (from Jordan, Weber, and Bear Rivers), while the north arm has none. As a result, the north arm has become increasingly saline due to evaporation, with a current level of about 30%. This is beyond the saturation point for salt in water, which has caused a thick salt crust (up to a foot thick) to build up on the northern lakebed. High salinity has caused the north arm to become entirely inhospitable to all life except for a select few algae and archaea species, which give the water a strong pink hue. If a "North Shore Monster" did exist, it would be long-since dead unless it moved south before the causeway's construction.
Map of Great Salt Lake, including a comparison of levels during its historic high (1986) and historic low (2022). The map includes markers for the four most prominent monster sightings in the lake. Each area where monsters have been sighted is now dry lakebed or marshland. Without intervention, most if not all of the lake will be gone over the next decade.
The Great Salt Lake is endorheic, or terminal, meaning that it has no natural outlets. Instead, water can only be removed from the system by evaporation, which leads to a buildup of solutes brought from river inlets. This is what cuases the lake's high salinity, but it also means that the lake naturally builds up dissolved pollutants from nearby rivers without any natural means of removal. These become stored in the sediment of the lakebed, leading to plumes of toxic dust as the shoreline dries up. An excess of fertilizer runoff also cause extreme algal blooms, which can be dangerous for local wildlife, such as migratory birds.
The final danger for the Salt Lake is its receeding water levels. The "historic average" altitude for the lake's surface is about 4200' about sea level (this corresponds to a max depth of 33' in the lake). This average is based on measurments made since the 1850's, and does not necisarily represent the lake's natural state without human interferrence. The historic high of the lake was in 1986, reaching a level of 4212'. This level has almost constantly receeded ever since, reaching its historic low of 4188' in 2022. This resulted in a surge of salinity in the southern arm of the lake to nearly 19%, which was dangerous to the local brine shrimp population. The shallow nature of the lake means that this small change of 12' from the average level has exposed over 50% of the lakebed. This has led to dangerous dust storms in the local area. The water loss of the lake is partly due to drought and higher temperatures, but it is mostly caused by the rerouting of water from inlet rivers to agriculture and other uses. Unless water usage in these rivers is significantly limited, the Salt Lake will continue to dry up, potentially collapsing entriely within the next decade.
Local environmental groups, such as Grow The Flow, are advocating for the restoration and protection of the Great Salt Lake. If any large monsters did live in the Salt Lake, such efforts would be crucial to preserving the life and legacy of these creatures.
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