Worms are a girl's best friend.

Jess and I have been interested in finding a particular type of worm--the spaghetti worm, or rather, the ELUSIVE spaghetti worm. This worm, scientifically known as Eupolymnia crasscornis, is a tube-dwelling worm, meaning that it has its own sheath, anchored to a substrate such as rock, in which it lives. The part of the worm that is most often visible to passerby are its extensive spaghetti-like purplish-white palps, which it extends across the rocks for feeding. The body of the worm, in its sheath, is usually adhered to the underside of rocks. As we have found, they seem to choose the largest rocks, obscuring them from view. We have been looking for these worms for over three days, and have not yet had a sighting of its body...Ay caramba! As we are only human, our attentions have turned to checking out a new kind of worm--the bearded fireworm. Luckily, its spines are only extremely dangerous, emitting a toxin post-puncture 😶. Most importantly, we have seen a ton more for our project than spaghetti worms...well I guess anything is more than 0. Pictures and updates to come, as we work on naming all 18 of them (thus far, one is Big Buff Cheeto Puff and another is Luis).

-Aya

P.S. For more info on our fireworms see http://marinebio.org/species.asp?id=292