Blue Button Jellyfish

Beauty Of Animal | Blue Button Jellyfish  | This sea creature is similar with Bluebottle Jellyfish/Portuguese Man of War and By-the-wind-sailor (velella velella). Actually, they are not true jellyfish, but they are colonies of polyps, or we know as Chondrophores. Blue button jellyfish live by floating on the surface of the sea. They range in Atlantic, Australia and Indo-Pasific.

Blue button jellyfish consists of two main parts, the float and the hydroid colony. The float is golden to brown. It is round and almost flat. The size  is only about one inch wide. The hydroid colony is bright blue turquoise to yellow in color. The hydroid is the tentacles  which make them like jellyfish. Each strand has numerous branchlets, each of which ends in knobs of stinging cells called nematocysts. The blue button sting is not powerful but may cause irritation if it comes in contact with human skin.

Blue button jellyfish feed on dead or living organisms. manily eat fish eggs, small fish, larvea, or zooplankton. Blue button jellyfish are hermaphrodites (i.e. both male and female). They release both eggs and sperm into the water. When the eggs have been fertilised by the sperm, they develop into larvae that subsequently metamorphose into individual polyps. A Blue Button colony forms when one polyp divides to form new types of polyps which become specialised for different functions.

Blue button jellyfish play an important role in food web.  They are prey for several organisms. Blue button jellyfish feed on both living and dead organisms. The blue button has a single mouth located beneath the float which is used for both the intake of nutrients as well as the expulsion of wastes. Unlike most jellyfish, blue button jellyfish do not sting. However, they can irritate human skin when touched. They typically float through the ocean using both ocean currents and wind to help them move. They usually travel in large groups, and you can sometimes find large groups of beached blue button jellyfish.

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