Coral

Description:

Coral polyps are tiny, soft-bodied organisms related to sea anemones and jellyfish. At their base is a hard, protective limestone skeleton called a calicle, which forms the structure of coral reefs. Reefs begin when a polyp attaches itself to a rock on the sea floor, then divides, or buds, into thousands of clones. The polyp calicles connect to one another, creating a colony that acts as a single organism. As colonies grow over hundreds and thousands of years, they join with other colonies and become reefs. Some of the coral reefs on the planet today began growing over 50 million years ago.

Habitat:

Shallow water about 75 ft. offshore.

Notes:

Carnivore Average life span in the wild: Polyp, 2 years to hundreds of years; colony, 5 years to several centuries. Corals are so sensitive to climatic change that scientists study coral reef fossils to construct highly detailed chronologies of prehistoric climate patterns.