The Onodera Group,a Michelin-starred Japanese sushi restaurant chain, placed the winning bid for the massive fish. Onodera GroupTuna is big business in Japan, where highly skilled chefs transform the iridescent fish into mouth-watering sashimi, sushi and nigiri. Theyre willing to pay top dollar for the best and biggest fish at Tokyos Toyosu Market, which hosts live auctions before dawn. But the first one each year typically garners the most jaw-dropping bids.On Sunday, a Pacific bluefin tuna sold for $1.3 million (207 million yen) at the markets first auction of 2025. Thats the second-highest price recorded since the massive seafood wholesale market began keeping track in 1999. (The highest price on record was $3.1 million for a 612-pound tuna in 2019.)Weighing in at 608 pounds, the behemoth fish was about the same size as a motorcycle or an adult male grizzly bear. It was snapped up by the Onodera Group, a Michelin-starred Japanese sushi restaurant chain, in partnership with tuna wholesaler Yamayuki. The company says it plans to serve the fish at 13 of its restaurant locations, according to a statement.The first tuna [of the year] is something meant to bring in good fortune, Shinji Nagao, the president of the restaurant group, told reporters after the auction, per the Agence France-Presse (AFP). Our wish is that people will eat this and have a wonderful year.Onodera Group, which has eateries in Japan, China and the United States, says it has now won the prize tuna at Toyosu Markets first auction five years in a row, as well as in 2018.A 73-year-old fisherman named Masahiro Takeuchi caught the enormous fish on a longline on Saturday morning. He was fishing near the town of Oma in northern Japans Aomori prefecture, reports Kyodo News.It was as fat as a cow, Takeuchi told reporters in Oma, as reported by Kyodo News. Its like a dream. Im always worried about how many more years I can do this job, but Im incredibly happy.2 2Watch on Sushi chefs love tuna from Oma, because the combination of the fishes fatty diet and cold habitat give them the perfect taste and texture for sashimi, a dish featuring thin slices of raw fish, reports the Washington Posts Leo Sands. Oma tuna are also known as black diamonds, according to the Oma Tourism Association.Pacific bluefin tuna are large, migratory fish found throughout the biggest ocean on Earth. A typical Pacific bluefin weighs about 130 pounds, but occasionally, these iridescent swimmers can balloon in size, topping the scales at nearly 1,000 pounds. They feast on squid and various types of fish, including herring, anchovies, saury, sardines and mackerel.Unlike most other fish, bluefin tuna are warm-blooded. They have a unique blood vessel structure, known as a countercurrent exchanger, that allows them to retain body heat, even when theyre submerged in frigid waters. This adaptation allows them to inhabit cold areas and dive up to 1,800 feet deep. It also makes them fast and powerful swimmers: The fish are known to cross the Pacific Ocean in just 55 days.Because of their rich, buttery flavor, Pacific bluefin tuna were overfished for decades. But, in recent years, international conservation efforts and fishing limits have helped the species rebound, according to the Monterey Bay Aquarium.Their stock has now been rebuilt to the point that U.S. commercial fishers are gradually being allowed to harvest more Pacific bluefin tuna. In 2022, they reeled in more than 800,000 pounds of the fish, which earned them more than $2.2 million. The ceiling was raised during the two-year period covering 2023 and 2024, when they were capped at 2.2 million pounds. For the 2025 to 2026 season, its set to increase again.The rebuilding of the Pacific bluefin stock is not only a success from a biological perspective but is also a success for the fishing communities and consumers, leading to greater economic opportunity and more U.S. seafood available for U.S. plates, said Ryan Wulff, an assistant regional administrator for National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administrations Fisheries West Coast Region, in an October 2024 statement.Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.Filed Under: Animals, Auctions, Conservation, Fish, Fishing, Food, Japan, wildlife