August 16, 1984 - The 200-Foot JellyfishPage 24' The Suffolk Times August i�; 1984
The 200 -Foot Jellyfish
By PAULSTOUTENBURGH
Summertime means boating, and so it
was last week found us meeting friends
from Montauk at Three Mile Harbor. As
we were a day early, we stopped off at
Sag Harbor. It's a lovely place and the
town and shops have a natural
attraction. We anchored out in the harbor
and left the lights and confusion of
mooring at a dock to those more inclined
to that way of life. Whenever we go on a
trip, it is nice to be able to go ashore or
take side trips in our dinghy. And so
never having been up in the back harbor,
Barbara and I headed out to explore this
inland waterway.
Our little 2 -h.p. engine did a fine job of
pushing us along at a slow, sight- seeing
speed. Once under the bridge and past the
power boat marinas, the area became
more to our liking. Individual docks with
sleeping boats dotted the shoreline.
Summer bungalows with their usual
bathing suits and towels hanging on the
line made us think we were back in one of
our creeks along the north shore. A rich
fringe of tall thatch grass lined the
water's edge and here and there a
mother duck with a brood scurried away
as we approached. All this gave you a
feeling of peace and serenity. Little did
we ever expect to find what lay below
this tranquil surface.
I've seen jellyfish in my day. As a
matter of fact, when we were kids years
ago down in Fleets Neck, the bay was so
full of these white demons with their long
tentacles, we couldn't even go
swimming. We even made an effort to
catch them using crab nets and had
buckets full in youthful anticipation of
ridding the bays of them. But never have
I seen jellyfish like we saw up in that
back bay area of Sag Harbor.
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Jellyfish Everywhere
There were moon jellies, the ones you
can see an outline in the dome that
resembles the shape of a clover. This
outlined shape is really the reproductive
cells of the moon jelly and in calm water
these moon jellies were quite beautiful to
watch. Their outer fringe, which
extended about two inches below the
mantle, flowed up and down with each
pulsation. These mantles are the food
gathering devices that direct food into
the central part or mouth of the jelly.
Some were as large as a foot across and
at times we could see as many as six or
eight at one time.
Besides the moon jellies, the more
common sea nettle was everywhere.
These are the whitish ones most of us
think of when we think of jellyfish, for
they have the long train of stingers
underneath. Some were the two and
three -inch size, but the vast majority
here were the small one -inch size that
nevertheless trailed its own string of
stingers.
This must have been the spawning
area of these sea nettles. Every couple of
feet you'd see one. Barbara said they
were as thick as if one had thrown a
handful of coins. It would be impossible
to swim or do anything in the water there
without rubbing against one. Like
mushrooms, everything must have been
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Photo by Paul Stoutenburgh
LIONS MANE- -These big maroonish red jellyfish are not as common as
the white sea nettle which causes so much grief along our bays and
creeks. One of the suggested remedies for the sting of jellyfish is meat
tenderizer. If jellies are around, it is worth carrying a small bottle with
you at the beach.
just right for their appearance --
temperature, food supply, location.
Everything perfect must have triggered
this tremendous crop.
I'm told the young attach to the bottom
where they remain over the winter. In
the spring, they change their form to a
plantlike stack of saucers which, as they
develop, break off into free - swimming
tiny jellyfish.
They grow rapidly, living but one year,
feeding on the rich plankton in the
waters. By mid - summer we start to see
them appearing throughout our bays.
Their pulsating movement not only
captures this rich soup but jets them
slowly through the water. They will eat
anything that comes their way --
including their own kind. Barbara's
sharp eyes saw one with four small
killies embedded in its dome. Evidently a
school of these little fellows unknowingly
strayed into the stingers and were
paralyzed. Yet when diving I've seen
small fish swimming among the stingers
of some jellyfish -- apparently without
harm.
Monster Jellyfish
The third jelly we have is much less
common than the moon or sea nettle. It is
the lion's mane. This is the grandaddy of
all jellyfish sometimes in the northern
oceans it reaches to eight feet across and
the stingers might extend 200 feet in
length. We never see such giants, but we
do see big, red maroonish ones over a foot
or more in diameter. They like other
jellyfish have flowing underparts besides
their stingers that bring the food up into
the central mouth part and on these
darker red jellies we can see this more
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prominently because of their color.
While we're on this somewhat
unpleasant subject of jellyfish, we should
know how to equip ourselves should we
be stung. The old remedies we used as
kids were alcohol, vinegar, calamine,
and, of course, a wash down with
old yellow laundry soap, but today the
accepted remedy is meat tenderizer. So
if you or your kids are going to be around
areas where the jellies might be, I'd
advise carrying a small bottle of this
modern -day relief.
Jellyfish sting by actually shooting tiny
microscopic barbs into you. Like the
poisonous darts the natives of New
Guinea blew through long tubes at birds
and animals, the jellyfish releases on
contact its barrage of poison into
whatever it touches, plankton, small fish
and even you and me.
Nature works in strange ways. From a
distance, all jellyfish are quite beautiful
to watch as they slowly pulsate and
extend their thread -like stingers behind
them but to the unsuspecting swimmer
or small child wading along the bay edge
they can be a problem. Let's hope we
soon see a decline in the number of jellies
in our area so we can all enjoy the waters
of our bays and sound even more.
Hillman to Speak
SOUTHOLD — Russ Hillman will pre-
sent a program entitled "Data -Base
Management" at tomorrow night's meet-
ing at 7:30 at Computer Folks on the
North Road. The program, which is free
of charge and open to the public, will
feature d -Base II- BASIC.
For further information, call Dave
Bruckheimer Jr. at 765 -5777.
Galley Ho
Restaurant
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