by Skeleton panda sea squirt (Clavelina ossipandae)
Where it lives: Off the coast of Kumejima, Japan
What it eats: Plankton and other small organic materials
Resembling a baby panda in a Halloween costume, this adorable species of ascidians, or sea squirts, was first described by scientists in 2024.
"The white parts that look like bones are the blood vessels that run horizontally through the sea squirts' gills.
The black parts on the head that look like a panda's eyes and nose are just a pattern, and we don't really know why the pattern is there," Naohiro Hasegawa, a researcher at Hokkaido University and co-author of the study that first described the species in the journal Species Diversity, told Reuters.
Source
Where it lives: Off the coast of Kumejima, Japan
What it eats: Plankton and other small organic materials
Resembling a baby panda in a Halloween costume, this adorable species of ascidians, or sea squirts, was first described by scientists in 2024.
"The white parts that look like bones are the blood vessels that run horizontally through the sea squirts' gills.
The black parts on the head that look like a panda's eyes and nose are just a pattern, and we don't really know why the pattern is there," Naohiro Hasegawa, a researcher at Hokkaido University and co-author of the study that first described the species in the journal Species Diversity, told Reuters.
Source
