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Currents: science and conservation

Lion’s mane: Beware this cool weather visitor

Tony Brown

The South Carolina Aquarium

Lion’s Mane jellies propel themselves around their display at the South Carolina Aquarium in Charleston.

Legions of pulsing, stinging jellies headed our way.

Into the cold, clear waters of winter drifts a visitor few will ever see.

The lion’s mane jellyfish, a worldwide cold water species, moves down from the northern seas to the Lowcountry coast, arriving most heavily in March and April, according to Shannon Teders, aquarist at the South Carolina Aquarium.

The lion’s mane has a colorful bell measuring 6 to 8 inches in diameter, with eight clusters of stinging tentacles hanging underneath. Compare that to the arctic lion’s mane, which can grow 8 to 12 feet in diameter with tentacles stretching as long as 100 feet (think nearly three school buses, end to end).

Teders notes that we only see the small ones here. They don’t do well in captivity either, making them a seasonal addition to the aquarium.

Lion’s manes depend on currents to get around, “but they can propel themselves a little bit,” Teders said. To move, the jellyfish contracts its bell, forcing water out in a primitive form of jet propulsion. Primitive, but effective. Jellies like these have been around for about 650 million years.

Where might one encounter a lion’s mane in the Lowcountry? Just about anywhere, according to Teders. From Charleston Harbor to Edisto, Kiawah, Seabrook, Folly and Sullivans islands… you name it.

What are the chances of meeting one up close and personal? Only surfers, Canadians and Yankees might venture into the surf in late winter and meet a lion’s mane, mano-a-tentacle.

The lion’s mane can sting, but surfers tend to be armored in wetsuits. And luckily for Canadians and Yankees, our coastal water is fairly clear this time of year. Unlike the nasty sea nettle jellyfish of summer, which has a clear bell, the red-brown patterns in a lion’s mane bell make it easy to see and avoid.

And, perhaps, to admire.

“I think they are the most beautiful species of the ones we have here,” Teders said.

Ow!

The sting is what everyone wants to know about. The sting serves as both a defense and method of capturing prey. The jelly’s sting has a two-part trigger, physical contact, and contact with a foreign protein. Each tentacle is covered with thousands of tiny poisonous stinging cells that propel tiny coiled harpoons on contact, injecting toxin into the unfortunate bumpee. Severity of toxin varies with the species. Even though Sir Arthur Conan Doyle made the lion’s mane a killer in one of his Sherlock Holmes stories, its sting is actually considered moderate. Teders said the sting is not as bad as the sea nettle, which can eat a lion’s mane.

Ow! Ow! Ow!

What to do when stung by a jellyfish varies wildly depending on the source. Everything from meat tenderizer, vinegar, sugar, urine, alcohol, baby powder, even fresh papaya juice are touted as remedies. The only trouble is, the sources contradict the other and some remedies will actually make the pain worse. So, you’re on your own.

One countermeasure getting good reports from summer surfers and beachgoers is Safe Sea sun block. Safe Sea makes a slippery coating on the skin that makes it difficult for the stinging tentacles to attach. It also absorbs secretions from the skin blocking the telltale foreign protein. Chemical stoppers in Safe Sea also block the chemical pathways where the stinging process is activated. The swimmer and jellyfish tentacles make contact, but slide on by each other, a feeling one surfer described as coarse hair dragging across his leg. Creepy, but painless.

Lion in wait

Lion’s manes don’t actually hunt their prey. They drift along in the current waiting for small creatures to make contact with their stinging tentacles, which paralyzes the prey. The hapless creature is then drawn up to the mouth.

Lion’s Manes will eat just about anything they can overpower with their toxin. Depending on the size of the jellyfish, this includes fish, plankton, other jellyfish and small crustaceans, according to Teder.

They do OK for a creature with no brain.

Toast and jellies?

It’s doubtful that you’ll find lion’s mane and grits on a local menu. Human consumption of jellyfish in general is not that common, occurring primarily in Asian countries such as Japan. But consider, the Japanese also eat the poisonous puffer fish to catch a death-defying toxic buzz.

Tentacles, anyone?

Tony Brown, an avid inshore saltwater angler, is the assistant copy desk chief at The Post and Courier.

Sources: Sea Science, www.dnr.sc.gov, Maryland Sea Grant, www.mdsg.umd.edu

Alan Hawes
The Post and Courier

Matt Gorman (left) and Larry Waddle (right) with the Edisto Beach Fire Department help carry Edisto toward the water. The turtle was rehabilitated after being found off Edisto Beach in May tangled in a crab trap rope.

Big ’ole Edisto heads home

Edisto has the look. He’s 300 pounds of pure, beady-eyed aggression. And he’s back in the Atlantic Ocean again.

The biggest loggerhead ever to be released by the South Carolina Aquarium, and the first adult male, took the plunge at Folly Beach County Park in October after four months of rehabilitation in the aquarium’s sea turtle hospital.

Edisto was the first adult male sent back to the ocean off South Carolina with a satellite tracking device on his back to give scientists a little more information about the turtles’ little-known movements. His release, though, came with a twinge of regret for the aquarium staff and a legion of fans he won up and down the coast.

Edisto made his presence known.

“He almost looks evil, his eye has so much personality,” said Kelly Thorvalson, aquarium sea turtle rescue program coordinator prior to the release.

“He doesn’t stop swimming; I’ve never seen this animal rest. If you walk up to the (turtle tank) window he immediately comes to the window with his mouth open. He has a ferocious look and a huge mouth. He’s just a big animal.”

Edisto was found in May 2007 tangled up in a crab trap rope with a buoy wrapped around his left flipper, cut to the bone with the flipper tip missing.

Rescued by the Edisto Beach Fire Department, he was treated at the South Carolina Aquarium’s turtle hospital.

The loggerhead turtle is a ponderous treasure of the Lowcountry. Females crawl out of the sea each summer to make nests in the dunes. Although slightly more than 1,500 nests were reported in the state this year, the turtles’ numbers overall appear to be dropping. It is one of seven sea turtle species and all are threatened or endangered.

The satellite tracking is important for researchers, who know far less about the number of adult males out there than they do about the nesting females. The mysterious males spend their lives at sea.

“We never see them,” said David Owens, College of Charleston biology professor. In 30 years studying turtles, he’s rarely had the chance to work hands-on with adult males before Edisto and Cape Romain, who’s also in rehab at the aquarium.

Researchers are concerned for the fate of males because of climate warming; females tend to give birth to more females when temperatures are higher, Owens said.

“We hope to find out where Edisto and Cape Romain over-winter and whether they come back to South Carolina waters to mate next spring,” Thorvalson said.

Edisto was released by a few of the firefighters and turtle watch volunteers who rescued him.

Source: The Post and Courier