Gooey 'alien' jellyfish found on beach in New Zealand

[LongTomH]

From LiveScience: Family Finds Gooey 'Alien' Jellyfish on NZ Beach. And It Looks Like a Jell-O Mold:

A family on New Zealand's North Island were enjoying an early morning walk on Pakiri Beach last week when they came across a monstrous, gooey blob with a gelatinous grape-colored center. Although it resembled a tossed-out Jell-O mold, it wasn't for eating — the glob was an enormous lion's mane jellyfish (Cyanea capillata).

Lion's mane are the largest species of jellyfish, with a bell that can grow up to 7 feet (2.1 meters) across and a thick mop of hair-like tentacles that reach nearly 120 feet (36.6 meters) long, according to Oceana, a nonprofit ocean research and conservation organization. They're much more recognizable in the water, where they gracefully drift with the currents.

These globular invertebrates spend most of their time offshore, floating around in the open ocean. But they're common in watersaround New Zealand during the summer, Diana Macpherson, a marine biologist at the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research in New Zealand, told Auckland Now.

Lion's mane jellyfish typically exhibit dark yellow or red coloration in the center of the bell, but the one the Dickinsons found stood outfor its vibrant dark red-purple center.

"We spent ages looking at it because of its beautiful colors and shape," Dickinson told Auckland Now. "My boy said it reminded him of a volcano."