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Other Inverts
Drifters
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Invertebrates

Grass Shrimp

Internal Cuttlefish Shell


Sea Anemone

Sea Nettle

Invertebrates of Galveston Bay


Sea Anemone
(Condylactis passiflora)
The sea anemone eats small fish and shrimp. The sea anemone captures its prey with its deadly stinging tentacles. Sea anemones reproduce by budding. If a sea anemone is torn apart by rocks, then each part becomes a new sea anemone.


Internal Cuttlefish Shell
(Spirula ----------)

Grass Shrimp


Interesting Facts:
These are detritus feeders using their long antennae to feel along the bottom. Link: Texas Shrimpers

Interesting Facts: Squid and Cuttlefish are related to mollusks. Most squid have lost all traces of a shell, but in several species such as the Spirula, the shell has become coiled and internalized.

Barnacles
They are arthropods which are related to insects, spiders, crabs, shrimp, etc... They gather food by using their foot to collect food into their mouth. Barnacles are considered a pest because they cement themselves to a surface such as boats... which slows them down.
Sea Nettle
(Chrysaora quinquecirrha)

Interesting Facts:
This is a common stinging jellyfish. They use nemotocysts (stinging cells) to stun small prey.
Coral
This coral is natural to the Gulf of Mexico and can be found in the Flower Garden roughly 100 miles from the Galveston Coast.
Coral
This coral can many times be found along the Texas City Dike and Bolivar peninsula. They were used as road metal or fill that was originally mined from the Oligocene (40 million years old) coral reef in Damon, Texas.

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Last Updated 04/06/04- Questions and comments concerning this page may be directed to Marty Daniel.
http://bioc.rice.edu/precollege