Vacationers have been warned to not enter the ocean on the Costa Blanca in southern Spain after a toxic sea creature was noticed.
Swimming was banned alongside a seven-mile stretch of coast round Guardamar del Segura space simply north of Torrevieja following the looks of so-called blue dragons.
Jose Luis Saez, the mayor of Guardamar del Segura, mentioned in a publish on X on Wednesday: “Bathing is prohibited following the appearance on Vivers Beach of two specimens of Glaucus atlanticus, known as the Blue Dragon”, including that individuals “should stay away from this animal because of its sting”.
Picture:
A blue dragon, or Glaucus Atlanticus. Pic: iStock
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Nevertheless, on Thursday, in one other publish, he mentioned the warning was now yellow after the ending of what he referred to as a “special surveillance operation”.
In any other case generally known as Glaucus atlanticus, it is a kind of sea slug, or nudibranch, that feeds on the lethal Portuguese man o’ battle and different venomous creatures.
Australian Geographic mentioned the “dazzling blue creature absorbs the stinging cells from its meals and shops them in concentrated doses, giving it a much more potent sting than its prey.
“Typical symptoms of the blue dragon’s sting include nausea, pain, vomiting and acute allergic contact dermatitis”.
Sea slugs usually stay on the ocean flooring, however blue dragons “swallow a little air bubble, which allows them to float on the ocean surface but means they’re at the mercy of the weather” and infrequently get blown ashore by robust winds.
Measuring usually “3cm or just over one inch in length,” in response to One Earth, the “ornate” creatures are discovered on the floor of the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans in temperate and tropical waters all through the world.
“The blue dragon stores the man o’ war’s stinging nematocysts within its finger-like appendages, making itself equally venomous to predators,” One Earth mentioned.