Baffled Australians try to figure out what these strange-looking ‘aliens’ with ‘sticky’ exteriors are washing up on beaches
Beachgoers are looking for answers after a bunch of mysterious ‘sticky’ sea creatures wash up on the beach.
The bizarre creature, which is covered in a series of yellow spots, led many people to suspect it looked like an ‘alien’.
One person who found the blob-like sea creature on a beach in Semaphore, about 21 kilometers from Adelaide, posted a photo of it on Reddit in the hope of identifying it.
Aussies are baffled by a mysterious creature that has washed up on the shores of several beaches
“Found it today at Semaphore, can anyone identify themselves?”
In the photo, the gelatinous figure appears folded in on itself, with a slimy, shiny exterior.
One user, a marine ecologist, said the unusual creature was “a type of ascidian” often found in coastal areas.
“Each of those little yellow dots is an individual animal called a zooid, all of which are genetically identical in the colony,” the user wrote.
The creature is a mix between vertebrates and invertebrates, the expert explained.
“So even though they are marine invertebrates, they are placed in the phylum ‘Chordata’ and form an evolutionary boundary between invertebrates and vertebrates,” the marine ecologist explained.
“They are, in evolutionary terms, your very distant, weird cousins that no one wanted at Christmas lunch.”
The ‘sticky’ like creature is known as ascidian and is commonly found in coastal areas
The creature feels slimy and ‘fleshy’, but is not as ‘soft’ as jellyfish.
Users were quick to respond to the post, with one saying the creature had features similar to an alien.
“Alien placenta,” the user said.
“I honestly thought it was a coiled snake,” wrote another.
“There must be a connection between this specimen and the danger noodle, perhaps more than we understand.”
The bizarre creatures are a mix between invertebrates and vertebrates, with the spots on the outside of the body made up of individual animals called zooids.
According to the Australian Museum, the creature’s scientific name is Botrylloides leachii.
They are a species belonging to a group called phylum Chordata, which includes animals such as fish, reptiles and birds.
Dark ascidians, the most common forms of the species, are found in coastal waters, at depths of 25 meters, as well as on seaweed and in shallow water.
According to the marine ecologist who commented on the Reddit post, ascidians are not harmful to humans.
The creatures, which belong to a group of species that also includes fish, reptiles and birds, are not harmful to humans