PORTLAND, Ore. — A mysterious pile of previously unidentified material floating in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Oregon was identified by scientists as an enormous clump of human hair and filth now known as the Great Pacific Dreadlock Patch, disgusted sources confirmed.

“I’ve scrubbed week-old dried fish guts off barnacle-crusted decks every day of my life, but never have I smelled such a thing. It was 500 yards wide if it was a foot, with a center so black I felt as if my soul may be swallowed, never to be seen again,” said Ben Rousch, captain of a fishing boat known as the Alice Jane. “It looks like a sleeping Kraken, drifting across the sea as a mindless zombie, waiting to wrap its arms around its next victim. It haunts me, I fear I may never return to my beloved sea.”

Portland Resident Sherry Thomas said she and her friends weren’t sure what to make of the patch at first, eventually deciding that something so natural couldn’t be all that bad.

“We didn’t really know if we should protest it or embrace it. It is all organic, mostly made up of hair, patchouli and beads, I can’t imagine it’s harmful to the environment,” said Thomas before applying her seventh round of natural deodorant of the day. “My friend Marley had the idea to paddle kayaks out to it. We figured we should get a closer look and see if there’s anything useful stuck in there. We had trouble getting through the thick outer arms, but we almost pulled a pretty good futon out of it. I mean, reduce, reuse, recycle, right? I even heard the center is made up of hundreds of healing crystals.”

Oceanographer Pat Garrund has been studying the Dreadlock Patch and its impact on regional marine life.

“It’s a disaster, an absolute disaster. The impact on marine life is significant. Several dolphins have become entangled in it like some sort of natural tuna net. Sea birds have been landing in search of food only to find discarded Funyun bags and ripped hemp shirts,” said Garund. “The salmon seem to have decided that swimming upstream is too hard and that crashing on their cousin’s couch would be an easier place to breed. The economic impact alone will be devastating to the Pacific Northwest.”

At press time, the Great Dreadlock Patch was drifting toward San Francisco despite city officials’ best efforts to steer it toward Hawaii.