I noticed these pink and almost transparent little creatures washed up on Hendry’s Beach this Monday.
I think these are sea cucumbers but can someone confirm or deny?
Is this a Sea Cucumber?
Edhat Reader
September 26, 2024, 8:53 am
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Looks more like a salp. Weird little buggers, but pretty cool!
Perhaps it’s a Tunicate: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunicate
I’ve seen tunicates on More Mesa Beach a few years ago. I have photos, but sadly, it doesn’t appear possible to share them here.
Yes, a salp. They’ve been loaded in the channel here for the last couple years. Red snapper, other rockfish, and bass actually eat them. They look like a poor food source but hey, you gotta eat.
Red snapper don’t live around here.
They’re vermillion rockfish, which locally are called red snapper by everyone who fishes, but yes.
It’s a Colonial Tunicate, a pyrosome . More commonly called sea squirt or sea pickle.
SBKAH – so is a tunicate a type of salp or vice versa? I’ve always called these things “salps” when I would see them on the beach. Interesting stuff. I do enjoy learning new things about our local wildlife!
I believe both the pyrosome and salp are tunicates….the salp can move, the pyrosome drifts…that’s why end up on beach in mass.
We often call them sea dicks. They’ve been abundant in the channel for about the last 2-3 years – like everywhere. The fish are coughing them up left and right. I personally don’t remember ever seeing them here in the past. This season on the water I do think there are much less of them.