Sea turtle and jellyfish

  I have to get pictures from Ron. We rode our bikes on the beach today, among other things. I was proud of how far I rode. Wet sand is a little harder to ride on. I spotted a dead baby turtle. It could fit in the palm of my hand. I wonder how it got to Samara beach, it's out of place. It's now how I expected to see one. Poor guy! I saw one jellyfish too. Also pretty rare. Of course, this was after we had played in the water. The blobby thing was completely translucent. Like it had on an invisibility cloak. It was so bizarre. I see why they call it a jellyfish, it was so unsolid (if that's a word?). Ron picked it up with a stick. So it had form, but it barely had from. There was still a tentacle thingy that hung down when it was suspended in air. Jellyfish have always been one of my favorite animals. "Cnidarians are among the oldest animals on earth; their fossil record stretches back for almost 600 million years! What can you say about animals that lack a central nervous system, a circulatory system, and a respiratory system? I could spend hours staring at pictures of them.
  Most poisonous animals deliver their venom by biting--but not jellyfish (and other cnidarians), which have evolved specialized structures called nematocysts. There are thousands of nematocysts in each of the thousands of cnidocytes on a jellyfish's tentacles; when stimulated, they build up an internal pressure of over 2,000 pounds per square inch and explode, piercing the skin of the unfortunate victim and delivering thousands of tiny doses of venom.

  So potent are nematocysts that they can be activated even when a jellyfish is beached or dying, which accounts for incidents where dozens of people are stung by a single, seemingly expired jelly", But wait, there's more! Jellyfish are equipped with hydrostatic skeletons, which sound like they might have been invented by Iron Man, but are actually an innovation that evolution hit on hundreds of millions of years ago. Essentially, the bell of a jellyfish is a fluid-filled cavity surrounded by circular muscles; the jelly contracts its muscles, squirting water in the opposite direction from where it wishes to go.

  Like most invertebrate animals, jellyfish have very short lifespans: some small species live for only a few hours, while the largest varieties, like the lion's mane jellyfish, may survive for a few years. Controversially, one Japanese scientist claims that the jellyfish species Turritopsis dornii is effectively immortal: full-grown individuals have the ability to revert back to the polyp stage (see slide #5), and thus, theoretically, can cycle endlessly from adult to juvenile form.

Unfortunately, this behavior has only been observed in the laboratory, and T. dornii can easily die in many other ways (say, being eaten by predators or washing up on the beach). So, I love those weird squishy guys. I tried to quote my source, but there were issues. I just googled Jellyfish Facts and picked the one at about.com.

 I collected some MORE shells too. I will clean them up and put them in my collection on the back porch. It's like my little zen garden. I want to build a fountain out of them one day. In a perfect world where building shell fountains is really easy...
  So the first picture was taken behind Ron's chair at a restaurant. There are 2 entrances, this is the second one, and it's 3 feet behind him. A group of surfer guys come and empty the truck, there is a surfing school in the same little area as the restaurant. They grabbed a hose and sprayed down the boards, I thought they were going to get Ron if they didn't pay attention, it was that close. Then 2 dogs were fighting briefly. Inside the restaurant area. Pura Vida, eh?
  I will work on more pictures! Then we arrived back at the house just before dark. The power was out. Hmmm. Limited options. It was a nice quiet time. Especially since I was so tired by then!