Terry catches a ray-finned fish from the ocean and notices that, attached to its flank, there is an equally long, snakelike organism. The attached organism has no external segmentation, no scales, a round mouth surrounded by a sucker and two small eyes. Terry thinks it might be a marine leech, a hagfish, or a lamprey.

Having caught and handled a hagfish, what will Terry’s shipmates most likely require Terry to do before returning to further fishing?

A) Clean the bucketsful of hagfish slime from the deck of the boat.
B) Spend some time below deck; only someone who’d spent too much time in the sun would remove hagfish denticles for later “analysis”.
C) Cut up the remaining hagfish and share pieces of this highly sought-after baitfish.
D) Dispose of the fishing tackle that had been poisoned by coming into contact with the hagfish.