Saturday, November 22, 2014

Salt-water chameleons

Maybe it's because they're transparent. Maybe it depends on what they're eating this week. Maybe it's where they've settled. Maybe they're akin to mood rings: whatever the reason, the orange-striped green anemones, Haliplanella lineata, in my tank are never the same colour twice in a row.

This is the largest of these tiny anemones, parked for the moment on sea lettuce in a bed of deep red Turkish towel and red leafy algae.

Open, showing mouth lining. Pinkish today.

Almost closed. Just the slightest hint of orange. And the green base is blue.

I don't know what those white lines inside the closed anemone are. Ingrown tentacles, maybe?

Tomorrow I'll be travelling, and won't be posting. See you Sunday!



3 comments:

  1. Such delicate tentacles. Beautiful. - Margy

    ReplyDelete
  2. Anonymous7:54 am

    A bit late, but those little strings visible through the body wall are probably acontia, part of an anemone's digestive system, and some corals and anemones can eject them as a defensive mechanism.

    ReplyDelete
  3. That makes sense! Thank you!

    ReplyDelete

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