By-the-wind Sailors
Animal highlight! By-the-wind Sailors, or Velella velella, live on the surface of the ocean where they literally go wherever the wind blows, hence their name. These jellyfish relatives are also related to sea anemones and corals, though one of their closest relatives on the oceans surface is the Portuguese man-of-war, which they are often mistaken for. By-the-wind Sailors, like much of their relatives, have stinging tentacles that they use to capture small prey such as krill, plankton, and fish eggs. They also have a special type of algae in their body that they can harvest for food. As many of you know, these eager sailors can be found very far from their home in the open ocean and often wash up on shore in large numbers. Currently, they are our most observed species!
I will be making weekly posts to highlight cool organisms and to keep everyone updated on what is going on with our project! If anybody has any suggestions or feedback on the project so far I would love to hear it, since we are just getting started, we are still trying to figure out how to make this page as easy to navigate as possible.
I hope everyone has a great week, I can’t wait to see what you all find!
-Ari Puentes
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