A fisherman was hurt after being bitten by a stingray he tried to release from his fishing line in Venice Beach overnight Saturday.
He was trying to take the hook out of the fish's mouth when it bit him on the left hand at around midnight, a Los Angeles Police Department spokesman said.
"He was taking the hook off and... seconds after he felt something, he felt numbness in his left arm," the victim's cousin Victor Reya, who was fishing with him at the time, said.
An emergency call was made after the man was bitten, however it was discovered he had only suffered minor injuries and he elected to take himself to a local hospital.
The stingray's whereabouts are unknown.
Stingrays generally do not attack aggressively or even actively defend themselves when threatened. Instead, their primary reaction is to swim away.
While they are related to sharks, their mouths are only visible from underneath. They employ their teeth to crush and grind crustaceans, a main source of prey for the fish.
