Story: Corals, anemones and jellyfish

Sea pens

Sea pens are soft corals, lacking a hard skeleton. Rows of specialised feeding polyps grow along the feathery branches of the central polyp. At night, sea pens give off green bioluminescence. This clip, filmed by Natural History New Zealand, shows the corals growing on the sea floor in one of the fiords of Fiordland.

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How to cite this page:

Dennis Gordon, 'Corals, anemones and jellyfish - True corals and sea anemones', Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/video/4726/sea-pens (accessed 27 April 2024)

Story by Dennis Gordon, published 12 Jun 2006, updated 26 Sep 2016