Blue Sea Dragon Appears on Australian Shore

The whole world seems to get incredibly excited over the news that a blue sea dragon appears on Australian shore. It is a very rare marine creature which doesn’t usually come ashore. Its official name is glaucus atlanticus and it’s part of the sea slugs family.

• Beautiful tiny creature washes ashore in Australia
• glaucus atlanticus was first discovered in 1777
• The blue dragon is a very poisonous predator only 1.2 inches long
• The slug feeds on invertebrates that it hunts and can sometimes resort to cannibalism if food is scarce

Someone lucky enough to encounter the beautiful creature has made a video which became viral shortly afterwards as everyone is curious to look at the tiny dragon’s magnificent colors. The blue slug was spotted at Broadbeach in Queensland.

However, as every beautiful rose has thorns the amazing blue dragon has a poisonous sting that ‘activates’ when the animal senses danger. The dragon’s sting can also be very painful and although the creature is only 1.2 inches long, its poison can be dangerous to humans as well. Therefore, experts recommend us to avoid touching the dragon at all.

As most intensely colored animals, the blue dragon also uses its color to survive. Being a marine creature, the blue makes it invisible to predators above and the silver on its other side helps it camouflage from predators below. This means the slug should almost invisible both from the above and from below as long as it’s in the water.

The dragon feeds on other poisonous invertebrates from which it borrows cells to create its own poison. It is able to do that because it seems to be immune to its prey’s poison. It also feed on other invertebrates by attacking large colonies and tearing them apart with its powerful jaws. Moreover, when it cannot find food, it may even resort to cannibalism.

The name of glaucus atlanticus was given to it by scientists who discovered and made its first description in 1777 when they couldn’t tell what type of mollusk it was. They later qualified it as a gastropod.

Australia is renowned for the amazing and mostly highly dangerous animals that reside there, whether they are on land or come from the sea. The Australian shore probably has many other surprise creatures to show us, besides the incredibly beautiful and incredibly dangerous tiny blue dragon.

Image source: www.bing.com