THE INVERTEBRATE LEGIONS 



129 



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Fig. 43. Top. The heche-de-mer, Holothuria, averaging about eight inches, is an 

 extremely sluggish mud-eater. The pearlpsh uses the heche-de-mer' s cloaca for a home 

 Cphotograph courtesy John A. Moore^. Bottom. The West Indian star, Oreaster, is 

 commonly found on sandy, weedy hottom among plants like turtle grass, Thalassia, 

 and the alga, the merman's shaving brush, Penicillus. 



-^'/ 





off in the flesh and Hberate a puipHsh fluid which stains the wound. The sensa- 

 tion is painful, but the effects are not generally long-lasting. The bits of spine 

 that cannot be pulled out soon dissolve in the flesh. Most sea urchins do not 

 bear such sharp, long spines, but sharp-spined species should not be handled 

 barehanded. Some that have short spines have poison glands associated with these 

 spines. These are the flexible urchins, one of which, Aerosovia, has a sting 

 reported by Phillips and Brady (1953) to be as painful as that of the Portuguese 

 man-of-war. Luckily, this urchin keeps to rather deep water. 



