A mysterious glow-in-the-dark sea creature shaped like a mini saxophone washes up on the shores of Sydney Harbor
- Strange ‘sea feather’ creature found in Sydney Harbor
- Wildlife experts rushed to identify the animal.
A strange alien-like creature has baffled a local explorer after it washed up covered in shiny slime.
The yellow oddity, which looked like a mini saxophone and was covered in hollow polyps and clear slime, was spotted washing up on the shores of Sydney Harbor on Wednesday.
The Sydney resident who found the creature took to the internet for help, revealing that its hands were covered in a thick, glow-in-the-dark goo when they tried to grab it.
Several scientists quickly stepped up to help, revealing the creature to be a sea pen, a common marine invertebrate below the surface of Sydney Harbour.
The internet went on a hunt to identify the ‘saxophone’-like creature
Sea pens are quite common below the eastern shoreline of the harbor.
The head of marine invertebrates at the Australian Museum, Professor Shane Ahyong, confirmed what kind of creature it was.
“They are relatively common in the eastern part of the harbor, well below the tide line, so only snorkelers and snorkelers see them,” Dr. Ahyong said. yahoo.
The sea pen in question had noticeable bumps on the bottom and a long stem, and the way it was set on the cement in the photo looked very much like a saxophone shape.
The most popular guess on Reddit, where the photo was originally posted, mislabeled the creature as a sea tulip, with others joking about its size and shape.
“That’s a marine saxophone,” said one.
Another joked that it was a horcrux buried under the Sydney Harbor Bridge.
“That’s Voldemort’s wand,” the user said, referencing the popular Harry Potter series.
Sea pens do not live above water and usually make their home in muddy sand beds like those found at the bottom of the harbor.
The animals are also bioluminescent, and their glowing slime is used to ward off predators.
The slime is completely harmless to humans.
Their diet consists mainly of drifting plankton, and their glow wards off predators.
A local Sydneysider found the sea plume along Sydney Harbor