[MUSIC]
Jellyfish might be the weirdest animals in the ocean. They're like 95 percent water,
which is really more ocean than animal. They're pulsating bodies don't hold a brain, or a
heart or any other organ that we'd recognize. It seems like they don't even know which way
is up half the time. But they drift through every ocean on Earth and they've been doing
that more more than 500 million years. So they must be doing something right.
I just don't know what is. Maybe I should go find somebody who can help.
So Tommy, where are we right now?
We are behind the scenes of the jellies exhibit at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. This is where
we try to grow all the jellies for our exhibits. So back here we have some animals that are
still a little bit young. In a few weeks, they'll be big enough to go on exhibit for
the public.
And what happens to the ones that are on the exhibit right now?
Well sometimes when a jelly gets old they become really good food items for the egg
yolk jellies. Some jellies need to eat other jellies and the egg yolk jelly is one of them.
They really really need gelatinous food in their diet. That's really important for their
health.
My great grandma used to really need a lot of gelatinous food in her diet too. Yeah.
The pulsing of their bell not only helps them swim around, but it helps swirl food into
their tentacles and oral arms. The stinging cells in the tentacles release a harpoon of
venom that stabs their prey and injects venom which paralyzes them and they can begin to
consume that prey.
But a lot of jellyfish, especially in the class cyphazoa, they have roughly oral arms
that are a lot like really long lips too that are really extensions of the mouth and the
gut so they can begin the digestive process on the oral arms.
I have to say my life would be so much easier if I could digest food with my hands and not
have to put it in my body. That would be amazing!
Delicious!
What do you call a group of jellyfish?
A smack!
This is the top of our sea nettle exhibit. Several hundred jellies. We've got a real
nice jelly smack here that we're looking at.
So this is as dense as we would find them in the wild?
Yeah and ya know in the wild they can be even denser. Sometimes, in Monterey Bay, when the
sea nettles bloom, it is like you can walk across the Bay on them they are so thick.
These jellyfish have never experienced the rush of being on camera. Actually no one has
ever filmed jellyfish on a GoPro before. This has never been done before.
That was all false!
So you've been stung by jellyfish a lot of times?
I've been stung by every single thing in here. Your average nettle sting is fairly painful
depending on how much tentacle contact you get. We do have flower hat jellies, which
is a fish eating jelly from Japan. Just a little bit of tentacle contact on my arm right
there where that scar is and it was like getting stabbed with a little knife.
Does peeing on a jellyfish sting really work?
Uh...I've never tried it.
Tommy do you ever...uh...look at these and just kind of like you know go some place in
your mind?
Sometimes.
Yeah totally.
If it seems like I'm having an amazing time bringing you the wonders of the ocean from
Monterey Bay, I am!
You should be...jelly!
But you can share the fun. Check out the rest of our videos in our Monterey Bay playlist
and stay curious.
Tommy thanks for showing me around. I just have one more question.
Uh huh.
Where are the peanut butter fish?
Peanut butter fish are kept in a different building. That would be a dangerous explosive
combination.
Of course.
That's jellyfish basics! You just do not do that.
I should have known. You're the expert.
(singing) I don't think you're ready for these jellies.