anemone

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A newly described anemone species has been found off the coast of Japan and appears to live exclusively on the shells of one hermit crab species.

First-of-its-kind video recordings of the hermit crab and anemone duo show the hermit crab moving to a new shell and spending more than 40 hours poking, peeling and dragging the anemone to come along.

Researchers believe the hermit crab and anemone are in an obligate symbiotic relationship, or that they need each other to survive. The anemone eats falling debris and protects the hermit crab from parasites and predators, and in turn, gets to hitch a ride to fresh feeding grounds.

In deep waters off the coast of Japan, a hermit crab is wearing haute couture. On its shell is the new-to-science anemone species Stylobates calcifer, named after the fire demon Calcifer from the novel and Studio Ghibli film Howl’s Moving Castle. 

A research team led by Akihiro Yoshikawa, a professor from the University of Tokyo, collected the anemone-hermit crab duo from the sea floor at a depth of 100 to 400 meters (330 to1,300 feet) in the sea of Kumano and Suruga Bay on the Pacific side of Japan. Researchers have published descriptions of the new anemone species in The Biological Bulletin. The newly described anemone species appears to live exclusively on the shells of the hermit crab species Pagurodofleinia doederleini, a hint that these two species are in an obligate symbiotic relationship […]. Much like a conch shell, anemones use their own secretions to form their shell-like attachments (in this case, to their hermit crab host). “The shell-making ability of the new species in the species-specific relationship appears as if Calcifer was in a magical contract with the Wizard Howl, constructing his Moving Castle,” Yoshikawa told Mongabay in an email. […] “Our study is perhaps the first observation of the behavioral interaction of the rarely studied amazing mutualism in the deep sea,” Yoshikawa said. There are at least 35 other symbiotic sea anemone species known to science that live on the shells of hermit crabs. This newest species is the fifth of its genus but the first found in Japanese waters.

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[Image ID: a black and white typography edit that reads "chivalry is not dead... chivalry is transsexual." in an old western-style font. there are a pair of work gloves, a pair of boots, a pair of pruning shears, and a single rose on the stem. the entire image is textured to look aged and photocopied. /End ID]

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Lissa Rankin | @wnq-psychology