By Laura
Geggel, Senior Writer | October 4, 2018 10:39am ET
Weird,
brilliant blue creatures with feather-like tentacles are washing ashore on the
beaches of New Jersey, surprising beachgoers who aren't used to seeing turquoise
blobs dotting the shore, according to news reports.
These
jellyfish-like critters are commonly known as blue buttons (Porpita porpita),
but they aren't native to the Garden State. Instead, it appears that Hurricane
Florence carried the tropical animals out of the Gulf Stream, a powerful
current in the Atlantic Ocean, and pushed them northward up the East Coast.
"It's
not something I've ever seen before, and I've been walking down that beach
since I was 10 years old. I'm 55 now," Holly Horner, a professional
wildlife photographer from Egg Harbor, New Jersey, told
the Asbury Park Press, after spotting blue buttons on a beach in Brigantine
last week. [In
Photos: Spooky Deep-Sea Creatures]
Although
they look like jellyfish, blue buttons are another type of creature (or rather,
set of creatures) altogether. They fall into the scientific class
Hydrozoa, whose members are each made up of colonies of hydroids — tiny
predators that are related to jellyfish. The most famous hydrozoan is probably
the Portuguese man o' War (Physalia physalis), which can deliver a venomous
sting so powerful that it can kill fish and even injure humans, according
to National Geographic.
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