by riordandave
Chain of Jellyfish
16:13 in Club Holidays, Cork, Diving, Ireland, Marine Life, Members, SCUBA by riordandave
This is the unidentified species that had us reaching for the reference books.
Chain of Jellyfish Originally uploaded by riordan_david.
This is the same chain of Jellyfish with Anto for Scale. Any good identifiers of species add a comment.
This colony consisted of much larger individuals than the usual white hairy string type of siphonophore that we often see in South West Ireland.
It is probably a different type of siphonophore.
Individuals in the colony consisted of a transparent bell (or medusa) longer than it was wide, and open at one end. Inside some, but not all, was a brown polyp about the size and shape of a wallnut kernel (maybe smaller).
The individuals did not seem to be moving or pulsating, just drifting.
Try asking this guy he has identified the subjects of a few of my underwater photos for me – http://www.glaucus.org.uk/andy.htm. Send him an email I’m sure he won’t mind. Good luck and let me know how you get on. D.
I saw a photo of something very similar in the New Scientist (issue dated 9th December). It was in the ‘Last Post’ column; somebody had spotted a chain of them while holidaying in the Greek Islands and was requesting identification.
I’ll try and keep an eye out over the next few weeks to see if someone comes back with an answer.
Sorry that should be ‘Last Word’ column. Here’s a link; http://www.newscientist.com/lastword.ns
Turns out to be something called a Salp, a type of pelaginous tunicate.