Scientists Discover Coral That Eats Jellyfish
Up until now, scientists believed that coral only ate plankton and other micro-organisms, but a new discovery shows the mushroom coral can actually eat jellyfish almost its same size. Scientists were diving near the Israeli city of Eilat in the Red Sea, when they photographed the phenomenon for the first time.
“We couldn’t believe our eyes when we saw it,” Ms Alamaru, a member of the research team, says. “This is definitely unusual. As far as I know no other coral are reported to feed on jellyfish. However, some sea anemones, which are close relatives of corals, are documented feeding on other jelly species.”
Scientists have suspected that coral must eat microscopic baby jellyfishes, but this is the first time they were presented with evidence of the animal eating adult jellies.
Link Image by Omri Bronstein from the Tel Aviv University
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Bubble Coral
Photo: RevolverOcelot
In the Pacific Ocean and parts of the Red Sea, bubble coral can be found in varying species, colors and forms. They maintain their egg-like appearance during the sunlit hours (maybe an egg-like disguise?), then deflate at dark, manifesting finger-tentacles that feed on plankton, etc.
See more of this beautiful creature at Environmental Graffiti.
Previously on Neatorama: Great Barrier Reef: Gone in 20 Years
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4-foot Worm Found in Cornwall
Matt Slater, a curator at the Blue Reef Aquarium in Newquay, Cornwall, England and his team were puzzled at the wreck their carefully grown coral reef had become. After weeks of watching the reef fall apart, they decided to take it apart to find the culprit. What they found was a giant reef worm!
“It really does look like something out of a horror movie! It’s over four feet long with these bizarre-looking jaws. Having done some research we also discovered that it is covered with thousands of bristles which are capable of inflicting a sting resulting in permanent numbness’.”
Matt believes it probably arrived as a juvenile in a delivery of living rock from another aquarium.
After being carefully removed the worm – which has been nicknamed ‘Barry’ by staff – has been re-located into its own tank, safely away from the coral.
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Crochet Coral Reef
This crochet coral reef is amazing. It’s actually an attempted replica of the Great Barrier Reef. The variety of textures and colors is as full as those in the reef itself. It took years to make, which can be easily recognized just by the look of it.
“Vast in scale, collective in construction, exquisitely detailed, the Crochet Reef is an unprecedented, hybridic, handicraft invocation of a natural wonder that has become, in itself, a new kind of wonder spawned from tens of thousands of hours of labor.”
Link Via Boing Boing
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