WEBVTT - Christmas Trees Beneath the Sea 0:00:03.000 --> 0:00:06.760 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:12.920 --> 0:00:15.640 Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My name 0:00:15.680 --> 0:00:16.800 is Robert Lamb. 0:00:16.800 --> 0:00:19.040 And I am Joe McCormick, and we have. 0:00:18.960 --> 0:00:23.279 A special holiday episode here for you today. It does 0:00:23.680 --> 0:00:26.800 concern Christmas trees of a sort. We have, of course 0:00:27.000 --> 0:00:29.440 talked about Christmas trees plenty of times on Stuff to 0:00:29.440 --> 0:00:32.559 Blow Your Mind in the past. I think the most 0:00:32.640 --> 0:00:36.040 recent installment being an episode we did a couple of 0:00:36.080 --> 0:00:40.200 years back, holiday inventions, Christmas tree lights, tinsel and angels. 0:00:40.840 --> 0:00:44.199 We've talked about Christmas trees and connection to sacred trees 0:00:44.240 --> 0:00:46.720 in the past, but today we're going to find our 0:00:46.800 --> 0:00:50.480 Christmas trees in an all new location. We are going 0:00:50.520 --> 0:00:52.040 to venture beneath the sea. 0:00:52.680 --> 0:00:55.160 That's right, it's mule tied in the deep today. 0:00:55.320 --> 0:00:58.520 Yes, deep down in the ocean in some cases, deep 0:00:58.560 --> 0:01:02.360 in the ocean where it's that Cuthulhu waits dreaming. But 0:01:02.480 --> 0:01:05.039 just maybe maybe he's dreaming of a white Christmas. 0:01:06.760 --> 0:01:08.720 He's dreaming of that red writer be begun. 0:01:08.920 --> 0:01:12.560 Yeah, so that'd we come around to Christmas trees under 0:01:12.600 --> 0:01:16.960 the sea. Well, credit where credits due. We had a 0:01:17.040 --> 0:01:20.120 couple of lead INDs to this one of the organisms 0:01:20.160 --> 0:01:22.240 we're going to cover here is one that was already 0:01:22.240 --> 0:01:25.319 on your radar and is also something that I've observed 0:01:25.360 --> 0:01:29.040 in the wild before. And then another source of inspiration 0:01:29.440 --> 0:01:32.800 was a twenty twenty one j Store Daily article by 0:01:32.920 --> 0:01:38.040 Sierra Garcia titled Meet the Christmas Tree Doppelgangers of the Sea. Now, 0:01:38.040 --> 0:01:40.160 obviously with a title like that, you know I'm going 0:01:40.240 --> 0:01:42.280 to give the post a second look. 0:01:42.440 --> 0:01:42.640 You know. 0:01:42.840 --> 0:01:47.039 Doppelganger, of course, being the German double walker, the uncanny, 0:01:47.080 --> 0:01:52.880 sinister and perhaps doom harboragering duplication of self. Christmas, with 0:01:52.920 --> 0:01:55.200 its hidden depths of darkness, seems a great place for 0:01:55.240 --> 0:01:58.080 such creatures to wander around. But of course it's not 0:01:58.080 --> 0:02:02.680 about actual doppelgangers. It's about things in the ocean that 0:02:03.520 --> 0:02:06.120 may or may not resemble Christmas trees, depending on how 0:02:06.240 --> 0:02:08.360 much you want to see Christmas in them. 0:02:08.720 --> 0:02:11.720 You know, my daughter is two years old now, and 0:02:11.800 --> 0:02:14.320 so this is going to be her first, her first 0:02:14.400 --> 0:02:16.919 really conscious Christmas, the one that I think she's really 0:02:16.919 --> 0:02:20.040 going to be very aware of. And of course at 0:02:20.080 --> 0:02:24.840 her age, I'm constantly thinking about like the recognition of objects, 0:02:24.880 --> 0:02:27.160 because she likes to point to things and either ask 0:02:27.240 --> 0:02:29.560 what's that or to say what the thing she's pointing 0:02:29.560 --> 0:02:31.640 at is, And a lot of times it's not the 0:02:31.680 --> 0:02:34.120 thing she says it is, but you can see the resemblance. 0:02:34.160 --> 0:02:37.760 And so I'm constantly thinking about the minimum visual criteria 0:02:37.840 --> 0:02:40.840 to associate a shape or some kind of sight with 0:02:40.880 --> 0:02:43.880 an object or a concept that she already has. And 0:02:44.200 --> 0:02:46.680 one of them now is Christmas trees. And so like, 0:02:46.760 --> 0:02:49.760 I'm wondering what kind of triangular thing this week, you know, 0:02:49.800 --> 0:02:53.720 she'll point out is that Christmas tree? And we're sort 0:02:53.760 --> 0:02:55.200 of playing the same game now, aren't we. 0:02:55.600 --> 0:02:59.359 Yeah, yeah, I mean you've got to call these organisms something, right, 0:03:00.639 --> 0:03:03.359 We've encountered examples of this before. You know, everything is 0:03:03.400 --> 0:03:07.280 an apple, according to Western explorers, some version of an apple, 0:03:07.320 --> 0:03:11.400 be it pine or otherwise. But you know, on another level, 0:03:11.400 --> 0:03:13.920 all of this kind of connects with the ancient notion 0:03:14.000 --> 0:03:16.040 that we've discussed in the show before, the idea that 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:19.320 if you look into the water, if you gaze deep 0:03:19.360 --> 0:03:23.520 into it, you're going to inevitably fine twins of things 0:03:23.520 --> 0:03:27.919 that exist above the water. You're going to find lions 0:03:27.960 --> 0:03:30.600 of the sea, cows of the sea, and so much 0:03:30.680 --> 0:03:34.280 more so. Maybe it's not all that off the mark anyway, 0:03:34.320 --> 0:03:37.520 that there are doppelgangers Christmas tree doppelgangers in the deep, 0:03:37.560 --> 0:03:39.920 because we have Christmas trees up here, so they must 0:03:39.960 --> 0:03:42.720 exist in the mirror realm beneath the waves. 0:03:43.400 --> 0:03:45.400 That's right. Well, are you ready to kick things off 0:03:45.440 --> 0:03:46.720 with my example here? 0:03:47.120 --> 0:03:49.240 Yes, Yes, this is a fun one. This is probably 0:03:49.280 --> 0:03:52.200 the one that's instantly coming to some folks mind out there, 0:03:52.280 --> 0:03:55.640 especially folks who have done a little snorkeling and scuba diving. 0:03:56.000 --> 0:03:57.880 Well, we're going to start in the place you might 0:03:57.960 --> 0:04:01.360 expect for undersea Christmas trees, and that is James Cameron's 0:04:01.400 --> 0:04:04.640 Avatar from two thousand and nine. I know, I was 0:04:04.680 --> 0:04:09.400 actually so reading an article about this that was linked 0:04:09.440 --> 0:04:12.520 in that Jay Store Daily you mentioned earlier. But this 0:04:12.680 --> 0:04:15.400 was a short article that was mainly just promoing a 0:04:15.480 --> 0:04:18.480 conference presentation, but it had some interesting behind the scenes 0:04:18.520 --> 0:04:22.480 details about the making of Avatar. Who was called of 0:04:22.520 --> 0:04:26.039 plants in film by Tanya Marion in The Botanical Artist 0:04:26.240 --> 0:04:29.120 twenty fifteen. And so I was talking about when Cameron 0:04:29.240 --> 0:04:32.359 was setting out to design the world of Avatar, he 0:04:32.440 --> 0:04:36.839 wanted to achieve some degree of biological plausibility, and the 0:04:36.880 --> 0:04:40.560 movie is set on a planet. Actually, I think it's 0:04:40.560 --> 0:04:44.359 supposed to be a moon called Pandora, which he was 0:04:44.400 --> 0:04:48.000 originally imagining as a place with low light conditions and 0:04:48.040 --> 0:04:51.000 a toxic atmosphere, so it would have kind of different 0:04:51.440 --> 0:04:55.560 different material pressures applying to the biosphere, maybe leading to 0:04:55.640 --> 0:04:58.080 different forms of life than we have here on Earth. 0:04:59.240 --> 0:05:01.400 And so in trying to dream up these life forms, 0:05:01.400 --> 0:05:05.440 he consulted with a plant physiologist from u SE Riverside 0:05:05.839 --> 0:05:09.440 named Jody Holt to help imagine the botany of the 0:05:09.720 --> 0:05:13.240 alien biosphere. It's kind of interesting how the plants they 0:05:13.400 --> 0:05:16.880 dreamed up in some way resemble life forms that are 0:05:16.920 --> 0:05:21.599 found not on the surface of Earth, but underneath Earth's oceans. 0:05:22.080 --> 0:05:25.440 So the movie features in some scenes a type of 0:05:25.640 --> 0:05:28.400 large ground flora I think within the sort of in 0:05:28.960 --> 0:05:33.560 universe lore. It's they call it like a zoo botanical 0:05:33.680 --> 0:05:35.520 or something like that. It's sort of like an animal 0:05:35.680 --> 0:05:40.240 plant combination. But whatever it is, it basically seems plant formed. 0:05:40.600 --> 0:05:43.679 It's a piece of large ground flora with spiral shaped 0:05:43.760 --> 0:05:47.440 foliage and in the universe of the movie it's called 0:05:47.560 --> 0:05:51.919 helicoradium spirally And in the movie we see that this 0:05:52.000 --> 0:05:56.279 plant has an unusual reaction to activity in its environment. 0:05:56.440 --> 0:06:01.800 When it is physically disturbed. These fan out, corkscrew shaped 0:06:01.880 --> 0:06:05.919 leaves rapidly recoil and fold up into almost nothingness. So 0:06:05.960 --> 0:06:08.760 you can be standing in the middle of a little 0:06:08.800 --> 0:06:11.400 grove of these things and suddenly they all fold up 0:06:11.440 --> 0:06:13.920 and you can see everything around you. It's a touch 0:06:14.000 --> 0:06:15.520 me not reflex. 0:06:15.800 --> 0:06:19.240 Very impressive effects in play here, particularly nice on the 0:06:19.240 --> 0:06:21.680 big screen and in three D. You know, say what 0:06:21.720 --> 0:06:24.480 you will about the Avatar films, but there's a lot 0:06:24.560 --> 0:06:28.680 of fantastic biological world building going on in them. And yeah, 0:06:28.760 --> 0:06:31.720 this is a great example of one of the organisms 0:06:31.720 --> 0:06:33.680 that Cameron unleashes on us. 0:06:33.839 --> 0:06:37.040 Yeah, And so it turns out this was one of 0:06:37.080 --> 0:06:40.160 the biological elements of the movie that was inspired by 0:06:40.279 --> 0:06:43.599 organisms that actually exist in nature, not so much a plant, 0:06:44.000 --> 0:06:49.320 but by an animal, the real animal called Spirobranchus giganteus, 0:06:50.200 --> 0:06:53.760 or the Christmas tree worm. And that's the animal that 0:06:53.800 --> 0:06:56.400 I want to talk about for a minute here. So 0:06:56.960 --> 0:06:59.600 first of all, your mind, if it works like mine, 0:06:59.640 --> 0:07:02.200 might be looking in the wrong direction here, because when 0:07:02.279 --> 0:07:05.680 I hear Christmas tree worm, for some reason, to me, 0:07:05.800 --> 0:07:08.839 it sounds like the name of a pest animal that 0:07:08.960 --> 0:07:12.120 is named after the crop that it is most notorious 0:07:12.160 --> 0:07:16.160 for infesting and consuming, So like the tobacco hornworm or 0:07:16.200 --> 0:07:19.720 the potato tuber worm. These are in reality both moth 0:07:19.840 --> 0:07:23.240 species that in their larval stages feed on night shade 0:07:23.280 --> 0:07:26.240 plants like the ones in their names, and other night 0:07:26.280 --> 0:07:28.840 shade plants as well. But you know, humans kind of 0:07:28.840 --> 0:07:33.040 have a sometimes a kind of economic agricultural mindset in 0:07:33.040 --> 0:07:36.640 interfacing with wildlife, so they can sort of name animals 0:07:36.720 --> 0:07:40.040 after the crop that that animal is causing them problems with. 0:07:40.440 --> 0:07:44.920 Yeah, it's like Christmas tree worms have ravaged the harvest again, 0:07:45.040 --> 0:07:47.160 is going to be a tough winner exactly. 0:07:47.720 --> 0:07:51.040 But the Christmas tree worm is not a caterpillar that 0:07:51.200 --> 0:07:56.480 infests Christmas tree farms. Instead, it is a marine tubeworm 0:07:56.680 --> 0:08:00.560 that lives on the surface of coral reefs. And so 0:08:00.680 --> 0:08:04.040 what's the association. Well, these animals are named after Christmas 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:08.200 trees because they look like Christmas trees. And yet sometimes 0:08:08.240 --> 0:08:10.880 these naming conventions are a bit of a stretch, But 0:08:11.000 --> 0:08:13.480 for my part, I think it's close enough. I think 0:08:13.520 --> 0:08:16.240 these worms really do kind of remind me of Christmas trees. 0:08:16.720 --> 0:08:20.640 Though I will qualify that, and my qualification is that 0:08:21.360 --> 0:08:24.920 it's not so much that they resemble the actual species 0:08:24.960 --> 0:08:29.320 of evergreens, which are usually fir trees that we use 0:08:29.400 --> 0:08:32.960 as Christmas decorations. The only way in which I'd say 0:08:33.000 --> 0:08:36.680 they actually evoke the trees themselves is in general shape. 0:08:36.880 --> 0:08:40.880 So like Christmas trees, the part of these worms you 0:08:40.880 --> 0:08:43.520 can see is a cone which is widest at the 0:08:43.559 --> 0:08:46.840 base and the narrows towards the top, and it does 0:08:46.880 --> 0:08:50.480 sort of have branches branches radiating for my central trunk 0:08:50.640 --> 0:08:55.800 or spine. They're also sort of needly needly branches, which 0:08:55.840 --> 0:08:59.200 you could compare to evergreen pine needle texture, but it's 0:08:59.240 --> 0:09:03.160 not exactly a perfect match when you look at it. Instead, 0:09:03.240 --> 0:09:06.160 I think the main way that they remind me and 0:09:06.200 --> 0:09:09.120 remind other people of Christmas trees is that they mimic 0:09:09.200 --> 0:09:13.640 a popular style of Christmas tree decoration, especially from years past, 0:09:13.960 --> 0:09:16.439 which is that you would have a string of lights 0:09:16.720 --> 0:09:20.360 or a brightly colored garland wrapped around the tree in 0:09:20.400 --> 0:09:23.520 a spiral pattern. I've got a couple of examples for 0:09:23.559 --> 0:09:25.400 you to look at here, Rob. I don't really know 0:09:25.440 --> 0:09:28.520 that much about historical patterns of Christmas tree decoration, but 0:09:28.600 --> 0:09:32.000 this reads to me as a more old style way 0:09:32.040 --> 0:09:34.320 of decorating a Christmas tree. I associate it with like 0:09:34.360 --> 0:09:36.000 the nineteen thirties or forties. 0:09:36.600 --> 0:09:39.400 Yeah yeah, And I guess maybe some of this survived. 0:09:39.520 --> 0:09:43.120 I don't know. I'm looking at this. I'm not sure 0:09:44.120 --> 0:09:48.280 when this style of tree decoration dies out or then 0:09:48.320 --> 0:09:51.640 again resurges again. For that matter, I'm not sure where 0:09:51.640 --> 0:09:54.319 we are now. We don't put a tremendous amount of 0:09:54.360 --> 0:09:56.880 thought into it. We just throw up the tree and 0:09:56.920 --> 0:10:01.600 we put our favorite decorations up and call it a day. 0:10:02.000 --> 0:10:04.840 Yeah yeah. My family never had a spiral garland on 0:10:04.880 --> 0:10:07.960 our trees, so it's not something I remember from personal experience. 0:10:08.000 --> 0:10:10.160 I feel like I've seen it in older media, which 0:10:10.160 --> 0:10:12.360 is maybe why I think of it as something that's older. 0:10:12.559 --> 0:10:14.680 We might have had a spiral garland, or maybe my 0:10:14.720 --> 0:10:18.120 grandmother did. I don't remember, but it feels like something 0:10:18.120 --> 0:10:21.080 I've seen in my life done somewhere. Hard to get 0:10:21.120 --> 0:10:23.440 excited about the garland, though, especially as a kid, because 0:10:23.480 --> 0:10:26.319 it's the individual ornaments and the lights that have all 0:10:26.320 --> 0:10:27.240 of the personality. 0:10:27.480 --> 0:10:30.000 I think, especially for people with brains like yours and mind. 0:10:30.000 --> 0:10:32.760 I think you and I were both like the illustrated 0:10:32.800 --> 0:10:35.320 dictionary kind of kids. We like things with lots of 0:10:35.320 --> 0:10:38.680 little individual in trees with the little illustration and explanation, 0:10:39.520 --> 0:10:41.920 And that's kind of what the individual ornaments feel like 0:10:41.960 --> 0:10:44.880 to me. I like individual ornaments with personality. 0:10:45.200 --> 0:10:47.080 Yeah, yeah, I think that's a good way opening it. 0:10:47.640 --> 0:10:49.840 But coming back to the Christmas tree worm, So if 0:10:49.920 --> 0:10:53.080 you do a search for pictures of this worm, you 0:10:53.120 --> 0:10:57.520 will find plenty of stunning underwater photos of coral reef 0:10:57.559 --> 0:11:03.000 surfaces speckled with multi colored pairs of spiral Christmas trees, 0:11:03.640 --> 0:11:06.880 each pair branching in a fork. So what you'll see 0:11:06.960 --> 0:11:11.200 are two little Christmas trees right beside one another with 0:11:11.360 --> 0:11:15.520 the same coloration. Now, each pair has a different coloration 0:11:15.600 --> 0:11:18.080 from the other ones around it, but within the pair, 0:11:18.240 --> 0:11:20.640 the two little trees next to each other that are 0:11:20.640 --> 0:11:23.000 growing in a V shape split at the base, those 0:11:23.040 --> 0:11:27.280 will be the same color usually. And one important thing 0:11:27.280 --> 0:11:30.880 to emphasize is that the Christmas trees that you're seeing 0:11:31.040 --> 0:11:35.160 are not the whole of the organism. Each pair of 0:11:35.400 --> 0:11:39.520 Christmas trees represents the two crowns, or feeding and breathing 0:11:39.559 --> 0:11:44.600 appendages of a worm, the main cylindrical body of which 0:11:44.679 --> 0:11:47.560 is hidden in a tube in the coral right beneath 0:11:47.640 --> 0:11:50.679 where the trees emerge. And whether or not you think 0:11:50.679 --> 0:11:53.080 they look like Christmas trees, these things are beautiful. I 0:11:53.120 --> 0:11:57.120 know they're especially popular as a site for like scuba 0:11:57.160 --> 0:11:58.319 divers and snorkelers. 0:11:58.960 --> 0:12:01.760 Yeah, I've got to observe these in the wild before 0:12:02.000 --> 0:12:06.319 snorkeling and Belize and in Roatan. They're one of the 0:12:06.360 --> 0:12:09.520 smaller pleasures of snorkeling in the shallows, and honestly, that's 0:12:09.600 --> 0:12:11.920 that's what I'm all about. When it comes to snorkeling. 0:12:11.960 --> 0:12:13.760 I don't really I don't really want to see anything big, 0:12:14.240 --> 0:12:17.560 you know, unless it's like a big coral formation. I mean, 0:12:17.559 --> 0:12:19.840 I see a bigger fish, it's it's neat. But I 0:12:19.880 --> 0:12:22.280 often spend my time with looking around for those little details, 0:12:22.320 --> 0:12:27.560 things that are you know, curling about inside the reefs 0:12:27.559 --> 0:12:31.160 and the rocks and and and you know, I think 0:12:31.600 --> 0:12:33.079 that's one of the things that makes something like a 0:12:33.160 --> 0:12:37.600 Christmas tree worm special. Now, in terms of whether they 0:12:37.600 --> 0:12:40.800 look like Christmas trees, I don't know. Obviously, It's one 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:42.640 of those things where I knew what they were called, 0:12:42.679 --> 0:12:44.880 but as they were pointed out to me, so I 0:12:44.920 --> 0:12:48.160 couldn't help but bring Christmas tree into the scenario. But 0:12:48.200 --> 0:12:50.160 the ones I remember looking at I tended to think 0:12:50.200 --> 0:12:53.439 more of like bristle cleaner for straws and tubes. 0:12:53.040 --> 0:12:56.800 You know, but gorgeously decorated. 0:12:57.240 --> 0:13:00.520 Yeah, like I don't remember them being the one I saw, 0:13:00.840 --> 0:13:02.959 mind you as colorful as the ones I see in 0:13:03.000 --> 0:13:05.880 some of these photos. But on the other hand, underwater 0:13:05.880 --> 0:13:08.120 photography is very much a lighting game. I mean, I 0:13:08.120 --> 0:13:11.079 guess all photography is a lighting game, and you know 0:13:11.800 --> 0:13:14.280 what you actually see with your own eyes and maybe 0:13:14.360 --> 0:13:17.480 less than optimal lighting conditions in the water. You know, 0:13:17.520 --> 0:13:20.040 they're not going to necessarily match up with what you see, 0:13:20.520 --> 0:13:24.360 you know, in somebody's showcase of underwater photography. But yeah, 0:13:24.600 --> 0:13:26.640 they still they do have a lot of character, you know, 0:13:26.679 --> 0:13:29.920 there's something sneaky and whimsical about them. A lot of 0:13:29.920 --> 0:13:31.839 the things in the water don't want to be seen 0:13:32.040 --> 0:13:34.560 and will do what they can passively or actively to 0:13:34.640 --> 0:13:37.560 avoid a clumsy human and a mask and a snorkel 0:13:37.600 --> 0:13:41.160 from seeing them. But Christmas tree worms tend to feel 0:13:41.280 --> 0:13:43.800 just a little extra cheeky in the way they hide 0:13:43.840 --> 0:13:44.319 from us. 0:13:44.640 --> 0:13:46.679 Like they're not just hiding from you, they're almost kind 0:13:46.720 --> 0:13:49.840 of playing peekaboo, maybe playing yeah hard to get Yeah. 0:13:49.640 --> 0:13:51.679 There is like a peekaboo feel to them, you. 0:13:51.640 --> 0:13:55.240 Know, yeah, yeah, you know. I was reading some guides 0:13:55.240 --> 0:14:00.160 to marine life and coral reef life that we're talking 0:14:00.200 --> 0:14:02.560 about people who try to get photos of these things, 0:14:02.600 --> 0:14:05.920 and apparently there's somewhat They're sensitive to multiple things, including 0:14:06.040 --> 0:14:08.679 changes in light conditions. So maybe if a shadow falls 0:14:08.760 --> 0:14:11.559 under them, they could retract, or if the flash of 0:14:11.600 --> 0:14:14.720 a camera goes off, they could retract, and then slowly 0:14:14.800 --> 0:14:17.480 over time, after they retract, they'll sort of re emerge. 0:14:17.520 --> 0:14:20.240 And so I think there might be some patience involved 0:14:20.280 --> 0:14:23.960 in trying to get up close and see them or 0:14:24.000 --> 0:14:26.160 to take a good photo of them, to kind of 0:14:26.160 --> 0:14:28.000 wait for them to come back out after you have 0:14:28.000 --> 0:14:31.800 spooked them the first time. But then another thing I 0:14:31.840 --> 0:14:34.040 saw in one of the sources I was reading was 0:14:34.080 --> 0:14:39.720 that how skittish they are might well depend on their surroundings. 0:14:39.800 --> 0:14:43.640 Like the ones that are in shallower, more turbulent waters, 0:14:43.720 --> 0:14:46.800 I think tend to be a little less skittish than 0:14:46.840 --> 0:14:50.520 the ones that are in deeper, more calm and stable waters, 0:14:50.560 --> 0:14:54.080 which sort of makes sense. Yeah, but anyway, Okay, so 0:14:54.120 --> 0:14:59.040 what's the biological rundown on the Christmas tree worm. It 0:14:59.240 --> 0:15:03.640 is a relative small polychete worm that lives the entirety 0:15:03.760 --> 0:15:07.040 of its adult life with the majority of its body 0:15:07.520 --> 0:15:12.360 hidden inside a calcareous tube that it makes initially on 0:15:12.400 --> 0:15:15.440 the surface of a rock or more often a coral reef, 0:15:16.040 --> 0:15:19.680 and then the tube can kind of become subsumed within 0:15:19.800 --> 0:15:24.360 the coral as the coral grows, and then the worm 0:15:24.480 --> 0:15:28.280 and its tube grows up along with the coral, so 0:15:28.440 --> 0:15:33.080 it begins life in a short planktonic larval phase, floating around, 0:15:33.120 --> 0:15:36.800 after which it lands somewhere on the reef secretes a 0:15:36.880 --> 0:15:39.880 tube made of mucus, which it lives in for a bit, 0:15:39.960 --> 0:15:44.120 and over time that mucous tube becomes cemented with solid minerals, 0:15:44.400 --> 0:15:48.120 and then within that tube, the Christmas tree worm metamorphoses 0:15:48.200 --> 0:15:51.240 and grows into its adult form, where it will live 0:15:51.320 --> 0:15:54.000 the rest of its life, growing with the structure of 0:15:54.040 --> 0:15:58.160 the reef, safe and secure and covered inside its tube 0:15:58.160 --> 0:16:02.680 by a nice lubricating blanket of mucus. I've seen different 0:16:02.800 --> 0:16:07.359 estimates on size range. According to a post by the NOAA, 0:16:07.480 --> 0:16:11.400 on average, these worms are less than four centimeters long, 0:16:12.080 --> 0:16:15.840 but according to marine biologists Eugene Kaplan in his book 0:16:15.840 --> 0:16:18.600 A Field Guide to Coral Reefs from nineteen ninety nine. 0:16:18.920 --> 0:16:21.560 Their body length can reach up to twelve centimeters or 0:16:21.600 --> 0:16:24.960 about five inches either way. They are small, but they're 0:16:25.000 --> 0:16:28.040 easy to spot because they're very colorful, and in some 0:16:28.120 --> 0:16:31.560 cases because of rapid changes that you can observe with them, 0:16:31.880 --> 0:16:36.480 most often them disappearing suddenly. So the exposed parts the 0:16:36.520 --> 0:16:41.400 two Christmas trees are two tentacles or crowns, and I've 0:16:41.440 --> 0:16:46.119 also seen them called gill plumes, arranged in a spiral 0:16:46.320 --> 0:16:51.040 or whirl pattern, which themselves contain what's called a bipinnate 0:16:51.240 --> 0:16:56.479 arrangement of hair like or needle like protrusions called radioles. 0:16:56.880 --> 0:17:01.480 And then those little needle protrusions are themselves perpendicularly covered 0:17:01.880 --> 0:17:06.399 in other smaller protrusions called pinules or cilia. So you 0:17:06.440 --> 0:17:09.320 can imagine a kind of fern shape. You know, you 0:17:09.359 --> 0:17:11.280 have the main stalk going out, and then you have 0:17:11.359 --> 0:17:13.680 branches going out from that stalk, and then out from 0:17:13.720 --> 0:17:16.080 the branches you got the little leaves projecting at a 0:17:16.200 --> 0:17:20.840 ninety degree angle. So these radioles covered in the cilia, 0:17:21.160 --> 0:17:24.000 the worm fans them out in this spiral pattern and 0:17:24.040 --> 0:17:27.960 then beats them in the water to catch floating phytoplankton 0:17:28.119 --> 0:17:32.600 and other bits of biological particle matter that will become 0:17:32.720 --> 0:17:37.080 the worm's food. The little pins sort of they catch 0:17:37.119 --> 0:17:39.680 hold of bits of organic stuff suspended in the water, 0:17:39.760 --> 0:17:42.639 and then they sort of transport those particles in a 0:17:42.720 --> 0:17:46.240 stream in little ridges along the surface of the worlds 0:17:46.640 --> 0:17:50.000 down to the worm's mouth. Delicious. So imagine kind of 0:17:50.080 --> 0:17:54.280 a spiral Christmas tree that gradually sucks in all of 0:17:54.280 --> 0:17:57.880 its ornaments, sucks the ornaments down the branches and then 0:17:57.960 --> 0:17:59.480 down the trunk and eats them. 0:18:00.080 --> 0:18:01.600 I mean, it sometimes works like that if you have 0:18:01.640 --> 0:18:03.880 a cat and Christmas tree. 0:18:04.160 --> 0:18:06.880 Now, these structures are not only for filter feeding, they're 0:18:06.920 --> 0:18:09.679 also for breathing. They are the worm's gills, and so 0:18:09.760 --> 0:18:15.680 the worm uses these radioals to extract dissolved oxygen from 0:18:15.720 --> 0:18:20.160 the water. Now, the activity that makes the Christmas tree 0:18:20.160 --> 0:18:22.960 worm notable as an inspiration for the plants in Avatar 0:18:23.320 --> 0:18:25.560 is the touch me not reflex. You know, when it 0:18:25.640 --> 0:18:31.000 senses danger through multiple types of stimuli, it can rapidly 0:18:31.080 --> 0:18:35.000 retract its two Christmas trees into the hole where it 0:18:35.080 --> 0:18:38.240 lives and on top of that it can also shut 0:18:38.280 --> 0:18:41.560 the door behind it. It has a flat body structure, 0:18:42.160 --> 0:18:46.560 sometimes capped with some sort of horny surface called an operculum, 0:18:46.760 --> 0:18:50.160 which it can slam shut over the opening of its tube. 0:18:50.240 --> 0:18:54.600 And we've talked about this adaptation the operculum in other species, 0:18:54.640 --> 0:18:57.760 such as snails. Snails sometimes have an operculum that they 0:18:57.760 --> 0:19:00.399 can use to cover the opening of their shell. Serves 0:19:00.400 --> 0:19:02.919 the same purpose, but of course, in the case of 0:19:02.920 --> 0:19:05.399 a snail, the shell is mobile. Here we'd be talking 0:19:05.400 --> 0:19:08.720 about a stationary tube on a substrate for a sedentary organism. 0:19:09.520 --> 0:19:12.880 We also talked about it in our episodes on hermit crabs, 0:19:12.920 --> 0:19:16.919 because in some cases the hermit crab will have one 0:19:17.240 --> 0:19:20.239 claw that is so made that it functions as an 0:19:20.240 --> 0:19:22.040 operculum at the opening of the shell. 0:19:22.440 --> 0:19:26.840 That's right, It's perfect little lid for their shell. 0:19:27.040 --> 0:19:31.440 That's right. So the operculum is a biological adaptation for 0:19:31.520 --> 0:19:34.920 slamming the door shut. Now, I wanted to shout out 0:19:34.960 --> 0:19:39.080 an interesting sort of ecological fact that I became aware 0:19:39.080 --> 0:19:42.200 of because I saw it in a PBS Nova segment, 0:19:42.280 --> 0:19:45.640 So thank you Nova. But the interesting thing is that 0:19:46.200 --> 0:19:49.639 there is some evidence that the relationship between the Christmas 0:19:49.680 --> 0:19:52.760 tree worm and the coral reef on which it lives 0:19:53.080 --> 0:19:56.280 goes both ways. Now, of course you can see how 0:19:56.320 --> 0:20:00.600 the worm benefits. The worm benefits from the coral skeleton structure, 0:20:00.920 --> 0:20:04.639 which of course provides it, you know, rigid protection against 0:20:04.880 --> 0:20:07.320 against predators, and you know, the tube it can live in, 0:20:07.560 --> 0:20:10.400 but also as it grows, it lifts it up into 0:20:10.480 --> 0:20:13.080 the water where it can have access to better waters 0:20:13.119 --> 0:20:17.480 for filter feeding. But the coral itself may also benefit 0:20:17.800 --> 0:20:21.200 from having Christmas tree worms all over it, because apparently 0:20:21.200 --> 0:20:24.159 the Christmas tree worms can provide a kind of protection 0:20:24.800 --> 0:20:28.240 for the coral against one of the coral's major predators. 0:20:28.880 --> 0:20:34.200 And that predator is the crown of thorns starfish aka 0:20:34.480 --> 0:20:38.800 Acanthaster plantsy or plunky p l A n c I. 0:20:39.640 --> 0:20:42.840 But I'll just say crown of thorns starfish because boy 0:20:43.000 --> 0:20:46.800 is the the epicness of that name appropriate. So imagine 0:20:46.840 --> 0:20:50.200 kind of a cross between a giant sunflower and an 0:20:50.240 --> 0:20:55.240 iron maiden turned inside out. These things are are absolutely 0:20:55.280 --> 0:20:59.919 from the hell razor universe, extremely wicked. They might. They're large, 0:21:00.040 --> 0:21:01.720 they might be roughly a foot and a half in 0:21:01.800 --> 0:21:05.760 diameter on average, coated in spikes, and what they do 0:21:05.840 --> 0:21:08.480 is they crawl over the surface of the coral reef 0:21:08.640 --> 0:21:12.399 just mowing. There's mowing the lawn, eating everything they can. 0:21:13.119 --> 0:21:16.040 According to that Nova segment, these giant starfish are in 0:21:16.119 --> 0:21:20.320 part responsible for the major decline of living coral within 0:21:20.400 --> 0:21:23.280 the Great Barrier reef. There are other factors at work 0:21:23.320 --> 0:21:26.720 as well, but when these things get going, a sort 0:21:26.720 --> 0:21:29.840 of explosion in the population of these coral predators can 0:21:29.920 --> 0:21:33.679 clean out a reef of living corals. And so the 0:21:33.720 --> 0:21:38.520 whole ventral surface, the underside of the starfish you can 0:21:38.600 --> 0:21:42.720 kind of think of as a vast digestive organ complex 0:21:43.200 --> 0:21:48.920 containing tube feet and this inverted stomach inside out stomach system. 0:21:49.280 --> 0:21:52.600 So it's just the underside of it is foreat it 0:21:52.720 --> 0:21:55.960 is just going to devour the coral underneath. And it 0:21:56.000 --> 0:21:59.080 turns out there's some evidence that if it comes to 0:21:59.119 --> 0:22:02.520 a part of a coral reef where there are Christmas 0:22:02.560 --> 0:22:06.520 tree worms, the Christmas tree worms can protect the corals 0:22:06.600 --> 0:22:10.439 directly underneath them because they get in the way of 0:22:10.520 --> 0:22:13.720 the starfish feeding and in fact they irritate the starfish's 0:22:13.760 --> 0:22:17.119 feeding organs. I looked up a paper, so I was 0:22:17.200 --> 0:22:19.439 trying to find the paper that was the source of 0:22:19.440 --> 0:22:23.320 this observation, and I found one published in the Marine 0:22:23.359 --> 0:22:27.560 Ecology Progress Series from nineteen eighty six by Devantier at 0:22:27.560 --> 0:22:32.880 All called does spiro Bronchus gigantius protect host porities from 0:22:32.960 --> 0:22:38.480 predation by acinhaster planky predator pressure as a mechanism of coevolution? 0:22:39.280 --> 0:22:40.840 And I was looking for the part of the paper 0:22:40.840 --> 0:22:43.159 that describes exactly how this works. I found it in 0:22:43.200 --> 0:22:47.960 their results section where they say, quote preliminary field experiments 0:22:47.960 --> 0:22:53.000 indicate that for certain worms, contact by acinhaster planky induces 0:22:53.200 --> 0:22:58.680 retraction followed by almost immediate reappearance with the operculum and 0:22:58.920 --> 0:23:03.040 bronchial crown pushing against the tube, feet and arms of 0:23:03.080 --> 0:23:07.040