Here are the twelve incredible facts about jellyfish:
- Jellyfish are invertebrates, that is, they have no spinal cord (the backbone that helps us sit up).
- Jellyfish have no brains – they have no hearts or eyes. Yet, they have been around in the seas for over 500 million years since history began to be recorded. In all these years, the shape of the jellyfish has hardly changed. They still strongly resemble their ancestors from 500 million years ago. Remarkable!
- The box jellyfish is considered the most vermous marine animal in the world. It has a cube-shaped body. Its tentacles are covered in poison-filled darts. Some of these box jellyfish have venom that can kill humans. Anyone stung by one of them can go into cardiac arrest or die within minutes.
- Jellyfish are mostly water. About 5% of jellyfish bodies are made of structural proteins, muscles and nerve cells, while the remaining 95% is water. Human bodies, by comparison, are up to 60% water.
- Groups of animals are usually given a collective noun as a name. A group of cows is a herd, for example, while many fish swimming together form a “school.” Jellyfish groups can go by three different names. A collection of jellyfish is called a “bloom,” “smack,” or “swarm.” Which other group is called a “swarm”?
- Jellyfish are not classified as a variety of fish. Fish are vertebrates that live in water and breathe through their gills. Jellyfish, on the other hand, are invertebrates, meaning they have no backbone and they absorb oxygen from water through membranes.
- In 1991, over 2,000 jellyfish polyps were blasted into space to test how they reacted to the lack of gravity. Those jellyfish reproduced in space, creating over 60,000 jellies, but the space-bred jellies weren’t able to function.
- While some are poisonous, jellyfish can be a delicacy. There are some 25 edible types of jellyfish. They’re typically added to salads or are pickled. As raw fish, they have a salty taste and the consistency of noodles.
- One type of jellyfish is described as immortal. The Turritopis dohrnii jellyfish is thought to be immortal, since it can turn into a colony of polyps (individual organisms). As the jellyfish grows old, it settles on the sea floor and becomes polyps. The polyps then give birth to new, genetically identical jellyfish.
- Jelyfish tend to follow the currents of the ocean as they move. So they can be found around the world in every type of ocean water. They can thrive in warm tropical water or cold Arctic water. They’ve been found at the bottom of the ocean and near the surface.
- Since jellyfish don’t have any bones, it is difficult to find fossils of ancient jellies. But in 2007, a preserved jellyfish fossil was discovered in Utah that’s thought to be over 505 million years old. Dinosaurs lived from about 245 million to 66 million years ago, meaning jellyfish pre-date them by at least 250 million years.
- Bioluminescence is the term for creature’s ability to produce its own light. Some jellyfish have this and produce an internal glow.
Picture Credit : Google