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Incorrectly referred to by me apparently and most Scuba Dive Masters as Basket Coral. It is not a hard or stone coral but a sponge. In existence for almost 500 Million years, these Giant Barrel Sponges are the supremely primitive Animals in our Planet.
They are the largest sponge in the reefs, with a diameter of 6 ft. and a height of a tallest man, 8 feet. They are the redwoods of the coral gardens, because of its lifespan of over hundreds to thousands of years.
Anilao Batangas is littered with these animals, these were particularly found in Batok Dive Site just off the shores of Sombrero Island. They also call it the Coral Garden, I call it the little Tubattaha, personally it is the most beautiful Dive site in Anilao which is why it is my first dive site in my series of Anilao Dive Sites. As you can see it is literally covered with soft corals and sponges and fishes are in swarms. I find it so beautiful and I hope Divers will keep it this way and allow this site to flourish some more.
Although you can see the Giant Barrel Sponge spawning everywhere in Anilao, these beauties are extra beautiful in Batok Dive site. Sometimes we see shrimps frequenting these barrels uninterrupted. Other Giant Barrel Sponges can be seen in Twin Rocks, Dive and Trek Marine Sanctuary and Layag Layag in Anilao batangas.
Found in shallow reefs and cannot transfer to another place because they are attached to the reef surface. They have skeleton that are glass-like and otherwise called Xestospongia Muta, in short X Muta. Very X yish, they respawn just like any other sponge, that if you pulverize them they can take on form and recover, very terminatorish right? Like an octopus leg, like well you get the picture.
They filter gallons of water through their body wall to feed themselves. Trapping food particles and excreting them in their inner bowl. They obtain O2 during this time and filtered wastewater leaves through their osculum or the large opening.
They are hermaphrodites, producing both eggs and sperms. They reproduce the way they feed, through the filtering process. Once the eggs mature into larvae they go out the Osculum and grow into new sponges on a nice reef surface. They can live up to 2000 years, growing up to 400 percent a year to sadly 2%.
Although they contain Photosythetic Symbiotic Cyanobacteria they are Commensals meaning, they do not depend rely on its photosynthetic symbionts to survive. The synechococcus Spongarium gives them the brown to dark red color. They do still get bleached from time to time but recovers quickly as well because they have a pathogenic condition. They are the utmost link to the Benthic-Pelagic or the nutrient energy cycling in aquatic systems. What most Filipinos need to learn, preserve so our oceans and reefs will be saved and in turn as so we because of Nitrification, a crucial element in Air and Soil Filtration. Why Life happened to flourish.
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