In April 2015, for several weeks in a row, thousands of mysterious floating objects appeared on the beaches of the West Coast of the United States. Their bodies are transparent, blue-purple umbrella-shaped, and they look slimy. It is estimated that the total number of plankton is more than a billion, and they are densely packed on the beach, most of which are dead and the rest are dying.
What are these mysterious planktons? Why did they go ashore en masse to commit suicide?
The float turned out to be a sail jellyfish
The first to discover these mysterious plankton was a local fisherman named Keller on the west coast of the United States. One morning a few weeks ago, Keller came to the beach and suddenly found a large blue thing lying on the beach, and when he looked closer, these things were slippery and looked like jellyfish, but not exactly the same as common jellyfish. Most of them are exposed on the beach, most of them are dead, and not far from the sea, the waves are still sending waves of floating objects ashore.
In the weeks since, there has been more and more floating debris on the beach, and they have appeared not only on the West Coast, but also on the California Coast. It is estimated that the total number of these plankton reaches a surprising billion. After expert identification, the identity of the little guys has also been confirmed.
It turned out that these strange-looking elves were close relatives of jellyfish, and their scientific name was "sail jellyfish".
Sail jellyfish have inflatable sail-shaped floating sacs on their bodies
Jellyfish is a very ancient aquatic animal that appeared on Earth 650 million years ago, older than the "age" of dinosaurs, and is a real "living fossil" (http://ask.kedo.gov.cn/zt/730904.shtml).
There are as many as 250 species of jellyfish, and they appear in a wide range, whether it is tropical or temperate oceans, whether it is shallow water or 100 meters deep oceans, and sometimes even freshwater areas can be seen. Most jellyfish are elegant in shape and beautiful in appearance, and sail jellyfish are among the best. Each sail jellyfish is about 7 to 10 cm long, the body is bright blue, and there are inflatable sail-like floating sacs, which when floating on the surface of the sea, these floating sacs stand up like a white sail, which is why they are also named "sail jellyfish", and some people call them "shunfeng shui hands".
The "sailors" can be described as uncompromising swimmers, they swim against the wind, follow the water, and fearlessly move forward on the vast sea, looking for food, and living a leisurely life. However, what is unexpected is that these elves actually gathered together, went one after another, and one after another rushed to the beach to commit suicide.
Guess 1: Collective "blind date" lost?
Some people believe that the sail jellyfish went ashore to commit suicide because they lost their way, and the reason why they lost their way is likely to be a large-scale collective "blind date" activity.
Sail jellyfish "give birth" in a very special way, they float on the ocean for many years, and whenever they want to breed offspring, adult sail jellyfish will sprout and copy the very small jellyfish. These small jellyfish are miniature versions of large jellyfish, and after they are copied, they will slowly sink to more than 2,000 meters below the sea to grow and develop, and produce sperm and eggs for reproduction.
Schematic diagram of the propagation process of jellyfish
Some people believe that the sea temperature rises in April, the sail jellyfish spring heart, in order to breed the next generation, they gather from all over the world, lively group "blind date". After the "marriage" ceremony, the little ones were overly excited, unable to distinguish between the southeast and the northwest, and accidentally hit and crashed onto the beach, and finally paid the price of their lives for love.
However, this statement is not reliable, because even if a few sail jellyfish are carried away by love, it is impossible for all sail jellyfish to make mistakes. More importantly, sail jellyfish, known as "sailors", have been "mixing" on earth for more than 600 million years, and if thousands of them had died at every turn, they might have gone extinct long ago.