{"id":33007,"date":"2023-10-23T16:36:18","date_gmt":"2023-10-23T14:36:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/53c5e115-1926-4ab5-a528-55ac77bbf5c4"},"modified":"2023-10-23T21:35:42","modified_gmt":"2023-10-23T19:35:42","slug":"weirdest-sea-creatures-meet-11-bizarre-animals-of-the-deep","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/rss_feed\/weirdest-sea-creatures-meet-11-bizarre-animals-of-the-deep\/","title":{"rendered":"Weirdest sea creatures – meet 11 bizarre animals of the deep"},"content":{"rendered":"

Have you heard of the Johnson’s abyssal seadevil? Read about this strange animal and more in our guide to the world’s weirdest sea creatures <\/p>

By Stuart Blackman\n <\/p>

Published: Monday, 23 October 2023 at 14:36 PM<\/p>

\n\n

The sea is brimming with weird and wonderful sea creatures, so we weren’t stuck for choice when it came to picking our list of the world’s weirdest marine creatures. From the vampire squid to the scary-looking Johnson’s abyssal seadevil, here are our favourite weirdest sea creatures \u2013 read on if you dare…<\/p>

Deadliest sea creatures: Meet the most dangerous animals in the ocean<\/a><\/li><\/ul>
11 weirdest sea creatures<\/h2>
Dumbo octopus<\/strong><\/h3>Dumbo octopus\/Image credit: Getty<\/figcaption><\/figure>
The Dumbo octopus \u2013 named after a certain cartoon elephant \u2013 is very much of this world, where it inhabits our deepest waters.<\/p>
In 2019, an unmanned submersible filmed one on the seabed at a depth of nearly 7km in the Indian Ocean\u2019s Java Trench, which is the deepest reliable record for any cephalopod.<\/p>
Squid vs octopus: what’s the difference between these multiple-limbed sea creatures?<\/a><\/li><\/ul>
Vampire squid<\/h3>
$\"Vampire$
Vampire squid\/Image credit: Internet Archive Book Images, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure>
Strange things lurk in the planet\u2019s deepest, darkest corners. And it doesn\u2019t get much deeper and darker than the bottom of the ocean, or stranger than Vampyroteuthis infernalis <\/em>\u2013 the \u2018vampire squid from hell\u2019.<\/p>
Despite its name \u2013 inspired by its dark colour and the cloak-like webbing between its arms \u2013 the vampire squid is neither vampire nor squid. It is the sole member of its own cephalopod order. <\/p>
Johnson’s abyssal seadevil<\/h3>
<\/div><\/figure><p>Anything going by the name of Johnson\u2019s abyssal seadevil is unlikely to score highly on the cute-and-cuddly scale. Though, to be fair, this one looks as terrified as it does terrifying. Equipped with needle-sharp teeth, a bioluminescent lure between its eyes and a stomach that can expand to accommodate prey much larger than itself, it is the quintessential deep-sea anglerfish. <\/p><h3 id=\"h-costasiella-sea-slug\">Costasiella sea slug<\/h3><figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"933\" src=\"https:\/\/c02.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/62\/2023\/10\/Costasiella-sea-slug-in-one-of-the-worlds-weirdest-animals.jpg?fit=1024,1024\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-91609\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Costasiella sea slug\/Image credit: Getty<\/figcaption><\/figure><p>Sheep might be strict vegetarians, but they are mere amateurs compared to this ovine character, which is herbivorous to the point that it becomes part vegetable itself. <\/p><p>The Costasiella sea slug \u2013 also known as the \u2018leaf sheep\u2019 and \u2018Shaun-the- sheep slug\u2019 for obvious reasons \u2013 spends much of its time grazing on marine <a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/plant-facts\/water-plants\/algae-facts-algae-blooms\">algae<\/a>. But it doesn\u2019t digest this plant matter entirely. Somehow, it separates the chloroplasts (the green organelles within a plant\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/animal-facts\/cells-guide-what-they-are-the-differences-between-prokaryotes-and-eukaryotes-and-how-they-replicate\">cells<\/a> that convert sunlight into chemical energy) from the rest of the meal and embeds them in its own tissues, making the slug a rare example of a photosynthetic animal. <\/p><h3>Emperor shrimp <\/h3><figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/c02.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/62\/2023\/10\/emperor-shrimp.jpg?fit=1024,1024\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-91610\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Emperor shrimp\/ Image credit: Getty Images<\/figcaption><\/figure><p>It\u2019s hard to say whether the clashing colour combos on display here count as edgy sartorial elegance or a hideous fashion faux-pas. Either way, this gloriously garish couple are hard to ignore. An emperor shrimp will spend its whole life on the back of its seaslug host. The relationship is one of mutual convenience: the shrimp provides a dedicated cleaning service in return for the protection bestowed by the mollusc\u2019s chemical defences.<\/p><h3>Giant isopod<\/h3><figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/c02.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/62\/2023\/10\/Giant-isopod.jpg?fit=1024,1024\" alt=\"Giant isopod is one of the world's weirdest insects\" class=\"wp-image-91632\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Giant isopod\/Image credit: Getty<\/figcaption><\/figure><p>A giant woodlice a foot long? Sounds like a mythical creature from the world of <em>Harry Potter<\/em>, but they are out there. Fortunately these creatures live deep in the ocean, at least 500 metres deep to be precise.<\/p><p>Not much is known about these arthropods but it is thought they are not as fearsome as the look, and scavenge on whatever they can find, from crab flesh to marine worms – well there’s not a lot of choice that far down<\/p><h3>Sea Pig<\/h3><figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\"><iframe title=\"Facts: The Sea Pig\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/GtuH9sz5Yfk?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen=\"\"\/><\/div><\/figure><p>You don\u2019t get much weirder looking than the sea pig, a genus of sea cucumbers that look straight out of Doctor Who. Named for their plump, pink, and rounded bodies, sea pigs are very abundant, but you are unlikely to ever see one, living as they do at depths of over 1,200 to 5,000 metres (that\u2019s over three miles!).<\/p><p>Their mode of locomotion is one of their many bizarre characteristics. They crawl across the deep-sea floor using specialised tubular \u201clegs\u201d that can be inflated and deflated with water, moving with hydraulics. This also allows them to churn up the soft mud under their \u201cfeet\u201d as they move, freeing bits of decaying plant and animal material to snack on.<\/p><h3>Giant siphonophore<\/h3><figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1996\" height=\"1484\" src=\"https:\/\/c02.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/62\/2022\/11\/Praya-dubia-c10e2a3.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-70977\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Giant siphonophore<\/figcaption><\/figure><p>It\u2019s not a fish, a whale or a jellyfish \u2013 the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/animal-facts\/marine-animals\/praya-dubia-facts\/\">giant siphonophore (<em>Praya dubia<\/em><\/a><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/animal-facts\/marine-animals\/praya-dubia-facts\/\">)<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0is the unlikely giant of the underwater world.<\/p><p>The giant siphonophore grows to more than 40m and lives in cold waters at depths of 50\u2013200m. It is a colonial animal, which means it\u2019s actually a long chain of individuals. Each one has a dedicated role \u2013 some sting and capture food, others digest and spread the nutrition throughout the colony, while the remainder are responsible for reproduction.<\/p><p>Definitely worth of a place on our weirdest sea creatures list – in fact, it made our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/animal-facts\/weird-animals\">most weirdest animals ever list<\/a>.<\/p><h3>Doto greenamyeri nudibranch <\/h3><figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"684\" src=\"https:\/\/c02.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/62\/2023\/10\/Doto-greenamyeri-is-one-of-the-worlds-weirdest-sea-creatures.jpeg\" alt=\"Doto greenamyeri is one of the world's weirdest sea creatures\" class=\"wp-image-91614\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Doto greenamyeri\/ Image credit: Bernard Picton, CC BY-SA 4.0 https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-sa\/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons<\/figcaption><\/figure><p>Whatever this is, it seems to have more eyeballs than are strictly necessary. Doto greenamyeri is a nudibranch sea slug, only described in 2015. It\u2019s about 15mm long, and those aren\u2019t eyeballs. (Nudibranchs have tiny eyes and very poor eyesight; they can just about distinguish light surroundings from dark.) Those are chemically-protected protuberances known as \u2018cerata\u2019, which flamboyantly advertise their toxicity to predators and also function as gills. The cerata have been likened to honey-drizzlers and stacks of pancakes or doughnuts. <\/p><h3>Polychaete worm<\/h3><figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" src=\"https:\/\/c02.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/62\/2023\/10\/Polychaete-worm.jpeg?fit=1024,900\" alt=\"Polychaete worm is one of the world's weirest sea creatures\" class=\"wp-image-91617\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">polychaete worm\/ Image credit: Hans Hillewaert<\/figcaption><\/figure><p>The feeling on the <em>BBC Wildlife<\/em> team is that this creature resembles something dreamed up by Jim Henson\u2019s studio. But this magnificent marine worm is real enough, and lives happily on deep-sea hydrothermal vents in the Atlantic. It is a polychaete, or bristle worm, in the family Nereididae, which forms part of a stunningly diverse class with well over 10,000 species described so far. The worm\u2019s impressive \u2018toupee\u2019 is a cluster of sensory hairs. <\/p><h3>Angelshark<\/h3><figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1024\" height=\"683\" src=\"https:\/\/c02.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/62\/2023\/10\/Angel-shark--scaled.jpg?fit=1024,1024\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-91611\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Angelshark\/Image credit: Getty Images<\/figcaption><\/figure><p>This shark looks like its been run over by a steam roller and well and truly flattened. The angelshark looks as if it\u2019s half way between a shark and a ray and they only grow to about 2.4 metres long. The have large, billowing fins on their sides, and two small dorsal fins perched atop the tail. It\u2019s advantageous for them to be as flat as possible as they spend most of their time buried in the sand on the sea bottom.<\/p><h2>More weird and wonderful wildlife<\/h2><ul><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/animal-facts\/birds\/weirdest-birds\">Weirdest birds: meet 12 strange and weird wonders of the avian world<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/animal-facts\/fish\/weirdest-fish\">Weirdest fish: 12 of the strangest fish in the world<\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.discoverwildlife.com\/plant-facts\/fungi\/weird-fungi\">6 of the weirdest fungi in the world, from dead man’s fingers to ‘zombie fungi’<\/a><\/li><\/ul><p\/><p\/><p\/> <\/body><\/html>\n<hr class=\"no-tts wp-block-separator\"\/>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Have you heard of the Johnson’s abyssal seadevil? Read about this strange animal and more in our guide to the world’s weirdest sea creatures <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":33008,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"6"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2023\/10\/weirdest-sea-creatures-meet-11-bizarre-animals-of-the-deep.jpg",1814,1653,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2023\/10\/weirdest-sea-creatures-meet-11-bizarre-animals-of-the-deep-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2023\/10\/weirdest-sea-creatures-meet-11-bizarre-animals-of-the-deep-300x273.jpg",300,273,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2023\/10\/weirdest-sea-creatures-meet-11-bizarre-animals-of-the-deep-768x700.jpg",768,700,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2023\/10\/weirdest-sea-creatures-meet-11-bizarre-animals-of-the-deep-1024x933.jpg",800,729,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2023\/10\/weirdest-sea-creatures-meet-11-bizarre-animals-of-the-deep-1536x1400.jpg",1536,1400,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/44\/2023\/10\/weirdest-sea-creatures-meet-11-bizarre-animals-of-the-deep.jpg",1814,1653,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"Have you heard of the Johnson's abyssal seadevil? Read about this strange animal and more in our guide to the world's weirdest sea creatures","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/33007"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcwildlife\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}

11 weirdest sea creatures<\/h2>