(Radio Iowa) – It’s common to see a jellyfish along a beach in a warm weather state, but it’s unusual to find one in an Iowa farm pond. That’s what D-N-R fisheries biologist John Lorenzen recently confirmed after hearing from a farmer in Guthrie County.

“What are the odds of jellyfish surviving in a pond in Iowa? And so my initial reaction was, it’s got to be something else. But they definitely were jellyfish,” Lorenzen says. He says the Peach Blossom Jellyfish, an animal native to China and are about the size of a nickel. D-N-R Aquatic Invasive Species Program Coordinator Kim Bogenschutz was intrigued by the discovery.

“Honestly I thought it was pretty cool,” she says. ” I think that these jellyfish are something that we just don’t know that much about. When I dug into the data, I did find two previous reports from quarries in Iowa.” Bogenschutz says the jellyfish do not pose any environmental concerns and, due to their tiny size, aren’t able to sting humans.

D-N-R officials say there are theories on how the jellyfish ended up in Iowa, including migrating birds, fish stocking, or someone dumping their aquarium, which is illegal.