Sunday, January 4, 2009

Tentacle Lickin' Good

From Paul's Reef - Apr 15, 2008

I fed my Bubble Tipped Anemone a small sliver of frozen Formula One yesterday. It closed around the piece of food and ate it. When it started opening back up I was able to snap this picture of the anemone with a tentacle still in its mouth. I never really knew before how it got the food to its mouth. I always thought that the tentacles kind of pushed it in that direction until it fell in. From this picture it looks like a tentacle grabs the food and places it in the mouth.

How does it do this? This animal has no brain. How does it know the spatial relationship between its tentacles and its mouth? Simply fascinating.