SoCal Divers: Have you seen this? Apolemia swimming bell!

[drbill]

I occasionally see detached strands of the siphonophores in the genus Apolemia around Catalina Island. Until this weekend I had never seen a polyp strand that was attached to its "swimming bell."

I'm curious as to whether other SoCal divers have seen the "entire" specimen rather than just the detached polyp strands? This living individual was far more colorful and had more structure than the detached strands I usually see. I've called these strands the "frayed rope" siphonophore.

By the way, the living specimen definitely could sting... but I bravely kept filming as it did since this may be the only time I ever see one! They are relatives of the Portuguese man-of-war, but I have no welts on my face from the stings yesterday.

 

[LLKZ16]

I have never seen the bell, just the strand.

 

[shoupart]

Same here; just have sighted the strand.

 

[headhunter]

I saw a strand like this at the Wrinkles dive in La Jolla and kept describing it as looking like a string of cotton balls with some orange throughout it. No one could tell me from my rather cryptic description what I may have been looking at. Now that I see these pictures, I know what I saw!

I've never seen one of these out for a cruise.

Christian

 

[drbill]

Just discovereed, thanks to a pointer from ScottFiji, that this is probably not one of the members of the genus Apolemia but a member of another siphonophore genus Praya. Cool, another "new" species on film. I would assume an Apolemia swimming bell would look superficially similar.

Here is the "Dive Dry with Dr. Bill" newspaper column I wrote on Apolemia:

http://www.starthrower.org/products/DDDB/DDDB_150-199/DDDB_189 Apolemia.htm

 

[PhotoTJ]

Very cool, per usual, Dr. B

 

[scottfiji]

Here's a video I made of a Praya, with a nice Giant Salp thrown in for free.

http://www.scubapost.net/forums/local_links.php?action=jump&id=126&catid=15

Let me know how you like it!

its a .wmv file, if you click on the above link it should automatically buffer and play (at least on my windows pc, in explorer it does!)

scott

ps - great Praya photos Dr Bill!

 

[drbill]

Scott... Thanks again for the pointer. Did yours bioluminesce? As I filmed up the strand towards the swimming bell, it gave off a bright green color (siphonophores generally bioluminesce in blue from what I've read). The footage will be featured on my next Dive Highlights episode of my "Die Dry" TV show.

 

[Rickster]

Hey Bill,
As Christian stated, I too, seen the strand at La Jolla. I have never seen the Praya attached.

Rick