Interesting Facts about Starfish

Interesting Facts about Starfish

Star-fishes are echinoderms (thorny cleaned sea urchins). They are generally called sea stars and are not by any stretch of the creative energy edge regardless of the name been given to them. Starfish can't swim, and they don't use gills to inhale. Lets explore some Interesting facts about starfish. 

·     Kingdom: Animalia

·     Phylum: Echinodermata

·     Superclass: Asterozoa

·     Class: Asteroidea

Ø Scientific name of startish is "Asteroidea". They are popularly known as the "Sea Star". Commonly Starfish has five arms but some variety have more than 5 arms. 

Ø These are not fish as they are invertebrates. They are related to Sea Urchins. Starfish gets it's shape from it's exoskeleton. 

Ø They have 5 arms attached to the central part of the body which is called as Activity Center of the Starfish. This central part contains the mouth of starfish. 

Ø There are about 1800 species of starfishes are found. They are found in shallow to deeper coastal water around the world. 

Ø Starfish has two stomachs, one for the digestion and other to expand and engulf the prey. Starfish can also change their gender according to their choice. 

Ø They use tube feet and other tubes that are present all over their body to breathe in air. 

Ø The largest Starfish in the world is "Sunflower Star" which is about 40 inches in length and weighs 11 pounds. Adult Sunflower Star has about 24 arms.

Ø The Smallest Starfish is "paddle-spined Sea star". They have size of 5 millimeters. They are found only along the coast of southern Australia.

Ø To pump nutrients through their nervous system, they use filtered sea water.

Ø These are Omnivores. They eat worms oysters, sea urchins etc. They have microscopic eyes at the end of each arm. They have no brain and no blood.

Ø They live in sea water and can't survive in fresh water. Most starfishes have the ability to regenerate arms. 

Ø Average size of starfish is about 5 to 8 inches in length from head to tip but some variety has a size of up to 14 inches. Their weight is 0.1 to 6 kg.

Ø They are found in different shades like pink, blue, brown, gray and red. Common starfish has a lifespan of about 10-15 years. 

Ø A female starfish releases about 1 million eggs in water which are fertilized by male starfish. These fertilized eggs develop into larvae which swim for three weeks.

Ø  Incredibly, ocean stars can recover lost arms. This is helpful if the ocean star is undermined by a predator. The starfish can drop an arm to escape. Ocean stars house a large portion of their essential organs in their arms, so some can even recover a completely new ocean star from only one arm and a bit of the star's focal plate.It takes very nearly multi year for this to happen.

Ø Starfish can eat outside their body. Because of their minor mouth on the underside of their body, starfish have adjusted a brilliant method for eating things bigger than it can fit in their mouth. 

Ø They have a stomach that can process nourishment outside their body, with the goal that it can fit in their mouth. This enables the sustenance to be additionally separated inside the body.