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Venus girdle (Cestum veneris) via Aquatilis

Taxonomy Tournament: Invertibrates

Tentaculata. This class of comb jellies have colloblasts, sticky cells that trap prey, on their tentacles

Porifera. This phylum is made up of sponges, some of the most basal animals, which are sessile and whose cells are not organized into tissues

Some ValenCTENES for your ocean minded beloveds.

The Common Objects of the Seashore. Written by John George Wood. 1857.

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Comb jellies, the shiny bags of the sea

Today we will be talking about the comb jellies! Despite the name comb jellies aren't usually considered to actually be jellyfish (depending on your definition). They are in their own phylum called Ctenophora.

Comb jellies are oval shaped, gelatinous sea creatures with eight rows of cilia along their bodies that they use to move. These cilia will often refract light in a rainbow pattern, giving them their beautiful and iconic appearances. Comb jellies are the largest known animals to move using cilia.

Comb jellies often use tentacles to catch prey, but unlike normal jellyfish which have stinging cells to stun prey, comb jellies are covered in sticky cells called colloblasts and do not sting.

Comb jellies may in fact be the oldest animal group alive today, with debate surrounding whether they branched off from the animal lineage before sponges. Though it is still contentious.

Image via Wikipedia

Ctenophores are more commonly known as Comb jellies, are marine invertebrates and resemble Cnidarians with a few notable similarities. Such as, lacking true organs, being mostly water, hollow gut, carnivorous behavior, tentacles, and are both diploblastic (having a body w/ only two embryonic layers). Many differences too though, like all cnidarians have stinging cells in their tentacles called nematocysts or cnidocytes (even if their stinging power isn’t always strong) but ctenophora have tentacles lined with sticky cells (colloblasts) so that they can catch prey. They also have different body shapes, Cnidarians that we consider jellyfish are radially symmetrical but Ctenophora are biradially symmetrical.

They are argued by some to be sister groups or even closely related but honestly jellyfish are closer to sea anemone than comb jellies based on our current evidence.

Creature Awaits #230

Each week I plan to feature an amazing creature, admiring God's fantastic artistry. Hopefully it’ll brighten someone’s day to see something new and interesting if they haven’t seen it before. : )

Continuing our October series.. "Cute…but Deadly" : )

(An awesome capture by Eric Polk (CC BY-SA 4.0 Deed))

The Bloody-belly Comb Jelly

Scientific Name: Lampocteis cruentiventer

Region: The Northern Pacific Ocean, usually between about 820'-4,921' (~250m-1,500m) deep

Size: About 6" (~16cm) long

Interesting Notes: As a comb jelly, this bizarrely beautiful creature doesn't move like a true jellyfish, but propels itself by rhythmically waving rows of hair-like cilia. Being totally translucent, its stomach's deep red color - one of the hardest colors to see at this ocean depth - stealthily keeps predators from spotting any bioluminescent meals still digesting within its stomach. Like its fellow comb jellies, instead of stinging its prey, it produces an extremely sticky, glue-like substance that holds its prey captive as it's slowly dragged into its mouth.

Glistening Jelly - a comb jelly near the surface.

Comb Jellies

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funky little comb jellies | source

Beroe abyssicola via Aquatilis

Taxonomy Tournament: Invertibrates

Tardigrada. This phylum is made up of tardigrades, also known as water bears, eight-legged segmented micro-animals. They're among the most resilient animals, able to survive high and low extremes in temperature and pressure.

Tentaculata. This class of comb jellies have colloblasts, sticky cells that trap prey, on their tentacles

Dryodora glandiformis

Spotted this gorgeous ctenophore and it absolutely made my night. The rainbows are caused by the little rows of combs it used to swim; as they move they refract the light, causing spectacular waves of color. Also please appreciate its silly wrinkly mouth in the second picture - it conveys an emotion I can't quite name.

I don't expect this to do numbers but it is my life mission to tell more people about ctenophores so poll:

life would be so much easier if i were a comb jelly. no thought. no sad. only glow rainbow colors.