A tropical sunfish found swimming in a corner of the main port on the Wadden Sea island of Texel on Wednesday has been taken to seal rescue centre Ecomare to recuperate.

‘It was chilled to the bone. It started its journey south too late,’ the centre’s ecologist Arthur Oosterbaan told local broadcaster NH Nieuws.

Sunfish have been spotted before in Dutch waters, Oosterbaan said. ‘But usually they only hang around for a bit in the North Sea before heading south when it get colder. This one was clearly lost.’

The species, which has a characteristic jerky way of swimming and whose shape gives the impression of it consisting of only a head, can grow to four metres long and weigh up to 1,000 kilos, making it the heaviest bony fish in existence. ‘This was a little one,’ Oosterbaan said, ‘only 60 cenitmetres long, which is normal for this area.’

Oosterbaan said the fish is making a good recovery but still has a way to go before he can be released into the wild again, possibly in the warmer waters of Portugal.