ZOOLOGICAL SOCILTV BL'LLKTLV 



beaches ami (lii:;s lnii!^' straii^hl Inirrous iiitn 

 the sandy sliDres. .\t iiiijilt in Murida tin- 

 whole beach seems alive with the white flick- 

 ering' creatures dartiiitj to and fro with al- 

 most incredible rapidity. Occasionally one 

 rushes into the water, and then often a lively 

 splash annininces that the ever-watchful jjray 

 snapper has ol)tained his soun^ht-for meal. 

 Late in August one may find little ghost 

 crabs, about one-eighth of an inch wide, liv- 

 iui;- upon the glaring sands of Fire Island. 

 But by far tlie greater number of our south- 

 ern visitors are those whose wliole lives are 

 spent lloating within the ocean. Such is the 

 niulti-hued Portuguese man-o'-war {f'liysalia 

 iircthiiSLi). a creature of the tropical Atlantic. 

 ]'>eautiful iridescent colors play over the 

 large pear-shajjcd air-sack which serves to 

 float the animal, or rather colony, for the 

 creature consists of a large number of s])in- 

 dle-shai)ed polyps, wiiose mouths are ever 

 ready to seize upon the unlucky fish who 

 may have ventured too near the long purple- 

 beaded tentacles with their myriad stings. 



Other creatures allied to the Portuguese 

 man-o'-war, but smaller, are the I'cldhu 

 whose crest is stiff and papery in appearance, 

 and the For pita, which appears as a beautiful 

 deep cobalt -blue disk with a greenish centre. 

 On the lower side of the ilisk is the large 

 central mouth, surrounded by rows of deep 

 blue tentacles armed with stings. 



Not all of our southern visitors are found 

 lloating, however, for in Great Peconic Bay 

 we find early in September a milky-white 

 jellyfish, which gropes about upon the bot- 

 tom and gives one quite a severe sting. This 

 is Tavioya liaf'loiuiiia. whose home is upon the 

 lirazilian coast, and along with this curious 

 jellyfish are a large number of other creat- 

 ures whose pro])er hcime is in the West In- 

 dies. 



Such is the case with the serpent star 

 (Of>IiioJi-nia olii'acciiin), a rich olive pentag- 

 onal disk with five long writhing arms, wliich 

 readily break off when seized. 



As the autumn passes into winter the 

 southern wanderers die away in the unwel- 

 come cold, and only the smallest remnant 

 survives the winter: but as the northerly and 

 easterly winds begin to blow, the cold Arctic 

 water, which has been Ijacked up to the 

 northward of Cape Cod throughout the sum- 

 mer, begins to creep down along the New- 

 York and New Jersey coasts, and to bring 

 with it a new host from the Arctic Ocean. 



Most of these creatures are too minute to 

 attract general attention, although their 

 presence in vast numbers often causes the 



ocean to glow with brilli;int phosphoresencc 

 when disturbed. 



The ]3ale. milky. disk-sha])ed jellyfish (.lii- 

 rcliaj, with its four pinkish horseshoe-shaped 

 ovaries, is one of these arctic creatures, as is 

 also the yellow and brown jellyfish (Cyaiica), 

 found off our coast in the spring and early 

 summer. In spring these arctic creatures be- 

 gin to develop rajjidly under the \varming 

 rays of the ascending sun, but by the middle 

 of Jmie the water has become too warm for 

 them, and they perish, as dii! the southern 

 \ isitors in the autunni. 



r.ut it is with our permanent residents that 

 we are most familiar, liveryone knows the 

 starfishes (Astcrias forbcsii) which abound 

 along our shores and which crawl slowly 

 over the bottom, pulling themselves along 

 by means of hundreds of little tubular feet 

 l)n)\ided with terntinal suckers. Woe to the 

 unlucky oyster or mussel which lies in their 

 way. The five flexible arms slowly wrap 

 around the bivalve, and hundreds of the 

 sucking feet begin to pull steadily but surely 

 until even the strong muscle of the shells 

 must yield. Then the starfish everts its stom- 

 ach and engulfs the mollusk. 



Long Island Sound is famous for its oys- 

 ters, which thrive best in shallow bays and 

 estuaries where the water is apt to be brack- 

 ish. The oysters feed upon minute floating 

 plants called diatoms, and also upon small 

 marine animals. 



During the summer their eggs are cast out 

 in myriads into the water, each full-grown fe- 

 male producing about 9,000.000. These rap- 

 idly develop into little helmet-shaped creat- 

 ures, which swim rapidly through the water 

 until the shells begin to appear, and they set- 

 tle down upon their left sides, there to re- 

 main throughout life. 



The pectens or scallops are also most 

 abundant in Long Island Sound, especially 

 where the bottom is covered with eel-grass. 

 They swim rapidly by opening and closing 

 the shells, and along the edges there are 

 dozens of little eyes, which enable the ani- 

 mals to be very wary of capture. 



Before leaving the mollusks we must pay 

 a moment's notice to the whelks, great pear- 

 shaped snails, w'hich plough along the sands 

 and crush to death other mollusks. Their 

 eggs are laid in long strings of disk-shaped 

 cocoons, resembling checkers strung to- 

 gether. Another sand lover is the Liiiiatia 

 licros. with a smooth round shell. The 

 "sand-collars'' found in shallow water in 

 summer are the egg clusters of this snail. 



One of the most interesting of our animals 

 is the little star coral f.lstraiigia danacv), 



