Ok, a confession.
As far as I know, there are no awards for jellyfish, but there really should be! So let’s celebrate this World Jellyfish Day with these six super-jelly awards.
1. The “you’re just puny humans” award
The lion’s mane jellyfish is also known as the giant jellyfish - and for good reason. The largest known specimen sported a 2-metre diameter bell and tentacles reaching more than 36 metres in length!
Apparently, the really big lion’s mane jellyfish tend to be found in the northern part of their range, which includes the subarctic and northern Atlantic and Pacific oceans.
Credit: Dan Hershman/Wikipedia (CC BY 2.0)
Credit: GondwanaGirl/Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 3.0)
2. The “small but perfectly formed” award
With a bell ranging between 5 millimetres and 2.5 centimetres in width, Irukandji jellyfish, like this Malo kingi here, are the smallest known jellyfish. Their tentacles, however, can reach up to 1 metre in length, which is much longer than some other jellies with larger bells.
3. The “I like it deep” award
In 2016 researchers sent the ROV Deep Discoverer some 3.7 kilometres beneath the sea surface to explore the Enigma Seamount. What swam across? Why a jellyfish of course! The researchers think its a type of Crossota jellyfish.
Credit: Batchware/Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
4. The “I laugh in the face of death” award
Turritopsis dohrnii truly earned its common name: the immortal jellyfish. Thanks to a process called transdifferentiation, when these jellies are faced with starvation or injury, they revert back to their juvenile polyp form and regrow anew.
5. The “tentacle fashionista” award
Most jellyfish seem to have long thin tentacles, but the giant phantom jellyfish (Stygiomedusa gigantea) doesn’t like to be like everyone. Their tentacles are like long, velvety scarves.
Credit: GondwanaGirl/Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 3.0)
6. The “Back off man, I’m a jellyfish” award
Back to our Malo kingi here, which is more commonly known as… the common kingslayer. These tiny jellies (and their Irukandji relatives) are the most venomous (to humans) jellyfish known. Even though most jellies just have stingers on their tentacles, these feisty critters also have them on their bells.