Is it seaweed?

By Peter Etnoyer, on May 7th, 2009 12 comments   Organisms, Vessels and Equipment   ninja, seaweed  

Meignorant.com posts a cool video of a “ninja seaweed” from the Red Sea, off the coast of Egypt.

Its definitely ninja, but is it really seaweed?

12 comments to Is it seaweed?

• jebyrnes

  May 7, 2009 at 11:55 · Reply

  My guess is that it’s some crazy burrowing worm. Damn, though, that’s the biggest feeding structure I’ve seen on one so shallow!

• Madhu

  May 7, 2009 at 12:11 · Reply

  A couple of marine biologist colleagues here in my department (including a seaweed phylogeneticist) suggest it might be some kind of sea cucumber – the oral tentacles of one.

  • Judy

    November 10, 2010 at 20:43 · Reply

    Sea cucumber ^__^ this is one of the defensive mechanisms of sea cucumbers. find out here —http://video.kids.nationalgeographic.com/video/player/kids/animals-pets-kids/invertebrates-kids/sea-cucumber-kids.html

• planktongrl

  May 7, 2009 at 13:36 · Reply

  My vote is for a holothurian (sea cucumber). Anyone send this to ChrisM at the Echinoblog?

• Jason R

  May 7, 2009 at 15:08 · Reply

  Just speculating, but maybe it is the chelonibranch of a buried arsegill sea turtle?

• Kevin Z

  May 7, 2009 at 15:43 · Reply

  Sea cuke

• Bob Abela

  May 7, 2009 at 15:48 · Reply

  Not sure I would touch it with my bare hands, appears to be a branching aneomones (Achinodendron sp).

• Peter

  May 7, 2009 at 17:10 · Reply

  Bob makes a good case for cnidaria. This one is a pretty close match: http://www.starfish.ch/Fotos/cnidarians-Nesseltiere/corals-Korallen-Anthozoa/hexacorallia-Hexakorallen/sea-anemones-Seeanemonen/Actinodendron-glomeratum2.jpg

• Liza J

  May 8, 2009 at 00:22 · Reply

  My first guess would be that it’s some kind of sea cucumber. The burrowing sea cucumbers at my work behave in the same way when disturbed.

• keir

  May 10, 2009 at 03:36 · Reply

  Another vote for sea cucumber/ holothurian – it appears to have five main “branches”, the oral feeding structures, which accords with the pentaradial body plan of sea cucumbers.

• Unidentified weirdness

  May 10, 2009 at 14:52 · Reply

  [...] on the identity of this bad boy over at DSN ranged from some sort of cnidarian (like a soft coral or anemone) to a sea cucumber or even some [...]

• Amy Wagner Fishing

  October 15, 2009 at 02:51 · Reply

  Wow that was really amazing I have never seen anything like that, it looks like sea weed but it also reminds me of an anemone because they too do that whole curling up thing except that they don’t go and bury themselves in the sand.