ID Help

[dzechman]

Saw this in shallow water in Cozumel. Anyone know what it is??

Thanks for your help.

Terry

Image by dzechman (Copyright) posted at ScubaBoard.Com

 

[archman]

Looks like an old glass fishing float that's been in the water a while. Did you touch it or get a sense for its texture/hardness?

 

[Tom Smedley]

You didn't give a size reference but it appears to be a Sea Pearl. These are the largest single cell plants in existence.

 

[SubMariner]

The colour looks to me to be just a little too blue & transluscent for it to be a sea pearl. However, from Paul Humann:

Dark green spheres with bright reflective sheen. Often covered with thin, silvery to light lavender algae. Attached to substrate by thin, hair-like runners. One of the largest single cells found in either the Plant or Animal kingdom.
Common to occasional in S. Florida, Bahamas, Caribbean.
Grow in most reef environments, often in small cracks and crevices with other algae. Tend to be solitary, but occasionally in small groups. May be encrusted with tunicates and other organisms.

 

[maractwin]

That picture doesn't look at all like Valonia (sea pearls) to me. I've got it growing in an aquarium here. I agree with archman that it looks like man-made glass.

-Mark

 

[archman]

Sea pearls aren't blue, at least not in the Caribbean. The shape and sheen certainly conform to one of the species, however. I forget which... the genus names keep changing.

 

[dzechman]

Here's another picture, cropped down from the original.

Image by dzechman (Copyright) posted at ScubaBoard.Com

The orb was about 3/4 to 1 inch in diameter. I didn't touch it, but I did wave my hand near to the object, to see if would move or change in appearance, it did neither. However, some sand was stirred up and stuck to the surface of the orb, making me think that it was not made of glass, but was sticky.

There wasn't a lot of current in the area, but I believe that there would have been enough to wash the sand from a smooth surfaced object made of glass.

I was about 20 feet down and near to shore, if that helps any.

 

[Rick Murchison]

Sure looks like glass to me. As for being sticky, sea critters can stick to anything, and there's probably a thin layer of life attached to the surface of that marble... and that's what's sticky.
Rick

 

[gfisher4792]

I believe it's a Josh Simpson Globe. Josh Simpson Infinity Project. Basically, you send him a proposal for a place to set one of his small globes (~2-4" diameter), and if accepted, he'll send you 2 globes for free (one to keep, one to place).

At the link above, if you click on the "Scrapbook" link on the left menu, you can see the spots other people have placed globes.

Incidentally, my wife and I received some, and I placed one on one of the reefs in Kauai.

 

[archman]

It might be a Josh Simpson globe, but it doesn't look "pretty" enough.

I pulled the recent Littler & Littler Caribbean Reef Plants tome, and the only "sea pearl" which conforms in shape/size/appearance is Ventricaria (formerly Valonia) ventricosa. They're never blue, in fact I don't know of any chlorophytes that are blue. If the hand waving was strong enough to stir up the sediments, a sea pearl would have moved at least a little bit. They're just big water-filled balloons.

One inch diameter is too small for a fishing float. But I've seen a lot of marine glass, and the whitish-coloured deformities are common for stuff that's been in the water for a while. I'll go with a big marble.