Could Your Sponge Eat You?
Well, only in the movies, perhaps. But here’s a real-life carnivorous sponge who lives two miles down in Monterey Bay, captures crustaceans with her barbed hooks, envelops them , and proceeds to digest them.
This is not the same as what plants like Venus fly traps do. Sponges, remembers, are not plants; they’re animals – probably the most ancient animals in the world. In other words, we’re all descended from sponges. [readon]
Harp sponges, so-called because they look a bit like a harp turned on its side, were first spotted by remote controlled cameras about ten years ago. And they’re only now being seen directly by human eyes.
(And since they’re living animals, we should consider not buying them for the shower.)
There’s more about the harp sponge and their eating and mating practices here. And here’s a video from the Monterey Bay Aquarium and Research Institute, which has been studying the harp sponge: