Posted on 07/30/2014 7:22:33 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Social media is teeming with pictures of small bright blue sea creatures washing up all over California beaches, with sightings reported in Humboldt County, Monterey and Ocean Beach.
Despite being described as "strange," "bizarre," "mysterious," and even "aliens," it turns out these creatures have a name.
Marine researchers are calling it Velella velella, a name the Santa Cruz Sentinel said sounds "like a nominee for the Best Foreign Language Film." "Some people call them jellyfish, but they are in fact only distantly related and only superficially similar," said Rich Mooi of the California Academy of Sciences.
The small delicate-looking marine invertibrates are commonly called "by-the-wind sailor." They are 40-80 mm long as adults and are characterized by a clear, chitinous semicircular sail sticking above water.
Velella can be found floating at the sea surface. They feed on zooplankton and fish and their predators are snails. They generally float offshore but can be blown onshore in large numbers.
Nobody knows for sure why so many are washing up this late in summer.
Although they are related to the Portugese man-o'-war -- notorious for its stinging ability -- Mooi said Velella is completely harmless to humans but doesn't recommend eating them.
Sharknado imitation.
This is common. We called them portagee sailors when I commercial fished on the beach.
Blame Clinton..
Velella Velella, one woman’s erotic journey from Milan to Minsk.
I was walking along the beach (PB in San Diego) very late one night (~2 am) when a large grunion run started. I ran to my apt next to the beach and called the local rock n roll station and told there was a grunion run in north PB. 15 minutes later there must have been 500 people running around with buckets grabbing the grunion by the fist full. Fun times.
Interesting.
Quick can them as is and ship them off to Japan for sale, we’ll make millions!!!!
Maybe the rumors about a cult of lemming smurfs is true.
“I’m not ‘necessarily’ saying they are aliens....but they are aliens.”
(according to ancient astronaut theorists)
yes a Velelnado
What wonders God has made!
Gaia is trying to tell us something. What can it be?
That southern California is about to turn into a huge, quaking sinkhole? Sure this has nothing to do with the water main breaks in Westwood or the tremor off Manhattan Beach all in the same day?
Fleeing the blue lagoon?
I want to go see the grunion run someday. I commercial fished smelt up north with an A-frame net. The grunion are a different critter and I would like to see how the runs differ.
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