Published 15:26 IST, June 24th 2020
Rare creature slithering towards ocean spotted, baffled netizens ask 'is it snake?'
The unornamented smooth snake-like arms confused the internet that immediately took to guessing the strange creature as spider man or an ex.
A footage of a rare marine creature with five symmetrical limbs slithering towards the ocean on a rock has befuddled the internet. Shared on Twitter by a user named Lydia Raley, the 31 seconds clip portrays a brown, roughly textured species with a centrally located disc body from which the tentacles protruded in a Penta-radial symmetry. The unornamented smooth snake-like arms confused the internet that immediately took to guessing the strange creature viewing the footage over 295.2k times.
“It’s not a labradoodle. That’s for dang sure, "wrote a commenter, that sparked several such hilarious reactions in the comments section.” It’s Snake Voltron where 5 snakes combine to fight those evil mongooses,” joked the other. “That is a nope rope. A danger noodle,” wrote the third, while one other added, that's five danger noodles “sharing a hat.” Another user shared a comical gif of a Llama sprinting with a comment, “If that’s what’s coming in July I’m out.” While some mocked hilarity at the unique creature depicted in the video, others more sensibly guessed what could it be. “It's actually a starfish,” a user said. “Brittle star... Type of starfish,” added others.
Species belongs to a Class Ophiuroidea
As netizens poured dozens of awkward guesses like “the bad guy from spiderman” and “an ex on social media”, the creature was actually correctly guessed by a few to be a serpent star, a type of brittle stars with smooth discs and rows of snake line projections coming off their center. The species belongs to a Class Ophiuroidea, with long, wriggling arms that makes them voracious scavengers or filter feeders. Unlike their sister starfish, the snake or brittle stars make one of the tentacles joined to a central disk as their head and have the ability to see with no eyes. Here’s a clip that depicts their nature as one of the brittle stars devour a squid alive.
Updated 15:26 IST, June 24th 2020