Help Identifying small jellyfish seen in Ventura Harbor
Description and Comments
There are many of these tiny jellyfish floating in the Ventura Harbor/Keys. i would love help identifying them. Are they babies?
Type of organism
Jellyfish
Quantity
100
Latitude
34.25
Longitude
-119.26
Comments
Looks like Scrippsia
Looks like Scrippsia pacifica, great to have a sighting so far south.
I agree it could be
I agree it could be Scrippsia, or maybe Polyorchis penicillatus, which is common in Santa Barbara, etc.
(Not clear to me why those two warrant different genera!)
Look in the middle of the
Look in the middle of the bell, see where the gastric peduncle protrudes downward and is very thick? That's Scrippsia, Polyorchis lacks that major feature and the manubrium comes right off a round, minimal, gastric peduncle. Also the gonads come off the gastric peduncle in Scrippsia, in Polyorchis they probably do as well but it appears they are just hanging from the top of the bell cavity. We still get them mixed up all the time though :-)