A sun star surrounded by sea urchins! There are tons of sun stars and urchins in the ECIM reserve that I work in. However, I've never seen them together. Maybe the urchins were eating the star? At any rate, very cool.
Monday, November 14, 2011
Echinoderm love
In case you didn't know, even though I study barnacles, echinoderms (i.e., starfish and sea urchins) hold a special place in my heart. So you can imagine my excitement when I came upon this sight while working in the intertidal yesterday:
A sun star surrounded by sea urchins! There are tons of sun stars and urchins in the ECIM reserve that I work in. However, I've never seen them together. Maybe the urchins were eating the star? At any rate, very cool.
A sun star surrounded by sea urchins! There are tons of sun stars and urchins in the ECIM reserve that I work in. However, I've never seen them together. Maybe the urchins were eating the star? At any rate, very cool.
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Sea stars are the carnivores helloooo! Remember they are not fish therefore not starfish ;)
ReplyDeleteDarling, I've seen things (like cannibalism) in urchins that you never want to see!
ReplyDeleteSo, 'starfish' (which I'll stick to because my mentor, Gordon Hendler, Curator of Echinoderms at the LA Natural history museum, even calls them that) are not the only carnivores!