2024-04-14 19:31:00
Divers off the Philippine, Indonesian or Japanese coasts are occasionally lucky enough to spot so-called “leaf sheep”. The name says it all: the tiny animals look like little sheep whose fur is made of leaves. It’s not for nothing that these things are also called “Shaun the Sheep”. In technical jargon, however, the animals are simply called sea snails or, in this case, Costasiella kuroshimae.
The little animals are so sweet:
In addition to the nicknames these animals receive, sea snails have some special characteristics:
Her size: These snails are very small, often only a few millimeters in size, which makes them difficult to detect.
Your color: The snails’ striking green color comes from the chloroplasts they retain in their cells through the kleptoplastidy method. This gives them a plant-like appearance.
Your photosynthesis ability: Kleptoplasty allows these snails to photosynthesize underwater by converting light energy into chemical energy. The fact that animals can carry out photosynthesis is very rare in nature.
The leaf sheep were only discovered in Japan near the Japanese island of Kuroshima in the early 1990s. This is where the name of the sea creatures comes from: Costasiella kuroshimae. Costasiella gives the genus name of all sea snails, kuroshimae indicates the location of the animals’ discovery. Because the leaf sheep were discovered so late and are difficult to find, little is known about the sea snails.
(aki)
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