We may think we're familiar with all the appellations of bizarre animals existing on our planet, but as new animal discoveries are made, we still get stroked with astonishment. From terrestrial, aquatic, and amphibious animals, there are some odd species with inconceivable appearances similar to those of plants. But others don't just have similar appearances like those of plants, they also have similar behavioral adaptations of plants. While the appearance of some categorically makes them intriguing—they can also be inconspicuous to predators looking to feed on them. Their spontaneous plant-like appearance can even make us mistake them as plants, but others have salient features that can still make us recognize them as animals.
10. Ramisyllis Multicaudata
The Branching Sponge Worm—scientifically identified as "Ramisyllis multicaudata", is undoubtedly one of the most bizarre worm species that exist. It inhabits the shallow waters of the Northern Coast in Australia. But finding one can be very hard because they live inside sea sponges, and even if you see one, if you don't know the creature, you won't even speculate that it's a worm. As innocuous and delicate as they are, leaving the sea sponges will only put them in precarious situations, thus staying concealed in them all their lives safeguards them from predators. But they can't leave the sea sponges, even if they wanted to. They have an indefinite number of bodies in the form of treelike branches that follow the many channels in the sea sponge. The branches can also propagate many sub-branches when they grow, and those sub-branches also propagate more branches, leading to a point the worm ending up with hundreds or even thousands of extremities. What is more unbelievable about its branches is that they're branching from a single head which lies deep within the interior of the sea sponge. Its indefinite number of branches can poke through holes in the sponge's surface. Except looking like tree branches, its body is also similar to a network of roots that grow incessantly.
9. Star-Nosed Mole
All the animals around the world are diverse, and there are many animals with odd noses that suggest the origin of their names. We have the Bottle-Nose fish—also called the Elephant-Nose. We also have the Bottle-Nose Dolphins, Long-Nosed Chimaeras, etc. All these appellations already give us the idea of how their noses look like. The Star-Nosed Mole was obviously given its name because its nose looks like a star. However, its nose is also similar to coral-colored flowers, and when the mole pokes out of the ground, it's almost as if it's a coral plant.
Yes, Moles are hideous animals—we've heard that a couple of times, but if you learn more about their extraordinary abilities, you will not only be astonished by their ugly appearance. They have amazing appendages, and their coral-colored flower-like or star-looking nose is made up of 22 fleshes of tentacles. These tentacles can detect and gulp down prey with astonishing speed. That even explains why they're the fastest eating animals in the world. As virtually blind as they are, they use their tentacles to survey their murky marshland habit. When they search for prey underwater, they blow bubbles, about 5-10 bubbles per second, which are blown to touch the surface of that prey. When the bubbles come into contact with the prey, the odorant molecules that impart smell mix with the air inside the bubbles and, with the same speed—they immediately suck the bubbles back into their nostrils. It's a remarkable technique they use to smell their targets underwater. When they find something that could be food, they identify it, simultaneously—they decide if it's edible; if it is, they eat it—all in just a quarter of a second. If you can imagine how quickly a second is for a predator to identify something, capture it, and eat it, it's unimaginable if all that is done in a quarter of that second. It makes it impossible for them to improve their prey-capturing speed by doing it much faster than they do.
8. Jelly Flower Hat
Jellyfishes are known for their bizarre jelly-like bodies that are transparent, but there are other jellyfish species out there in the ocean that we've never seen before. The Jelly Flower Hat, scientifically known as Olindias Formosa, is certainly one of them. It's a rare species of jellyfish. They can only be found primarily in the waters off Brazil, Argentina, and southern Japan. Their conservative status is currently unknown because they live close to the ocean floor, although sometimes they do occasionally rise to the surface. Unlike other jellyfish species that are transparent, Jelly Flower Hats are different because their bellies are translucent and pinstriped with opaque bands. Their bodies are their most appealing feature, with striking colors varying from mixes of: blue, pink, orange, purple, yellow, and green. They look like colorful neon flowers with hats on them—or hats with flowers on them (hence the name). Another peculiar aspect about them is that they have no head, brain, heart, cartilage or real eyes, but to all crustaceans and small fishes, they're still the most feared predators. They have shiny tentacles that coil and adhere to the edge when in use. Underneath them, they have other longer tentacles that have stinging cells called mematocysts, which all cnidarians have. These tentacles are what they use to attack prey. When they're seen among other colorful plants of the ocean, it's easy to mistake them as plants. However, they're not as big as they seem in the image. They only grow about 6 inches in diameter.
7. Coral (Anthozoa)
You will be startled if you see strange plants deep in the ocean, but it's nothing compared to how stunned will you be when realizing that they're actually animals. Class Anthozoa, also referred as anthozoans, is the largest class of cnidarians. Coral Animals are also included in that class. They are generally brightly colored cnidarians with a plant-like appearance. Unlike most animals mentioned on this list, corals appear to be half animals and half plants according to how they live and how they look like. What is more interesting about corals is that all their species are unique, but still, they all look like plants. The coral animal species that look exactly like plants include the Plate corals, Bamboo corals, Primnoid corals, Hydrocorals, Tube Sponge corals, Lettuce corals, Ivory Bush corals, Elkhorn corals, and Staghorn corals. But there are more out there. Currently, there are around 70,000 different species of coral found throughout the ocean of the world. They also use the photosynthesis process just like plants. But they're also carnivorous animals, so except getting food with the photosynthesis process, they hunt for prey. On their tentacles, they have stinging cells which they use to paralyze small fish and animals such as planktons.
6. Leafy Sea Dragon
Leafy Sea Dragons are known as some of the most ornately camouflaged creatures on the planet. They don't look almost like plants, they look exactly like plants. With their gossamer leaf-like fins and frilly appendages over their entire bodies, you would swear that they are plants. Their small dorsal and leaf-like pectoral fins are transparent, and they use them to propel and steer themselves awkwardly through the water. Despite their fearsome name, they're not wild or harmful to other marine mammals. They don't even have teeth; instead of biting, they suck their food down their long tube-snout, just like seahorses and piper-fish. Their tube-like mouths work like drinking straws, and they can slurp up thousands of prey each day. Tiny crustaceans such as mysids and sea lice are their diet, but it's not known if they're preyed upon by other animals. They're nearly impossible to spot among the plants as they slowly sway back and forth with the current. Only two species of sea dragon exist, which is, the Leafy Sea Dragon and the Weedy Sea Dragon.
5. Pale Tussock Moth
The Pale Tussock Moth is one of the largest caterpillars of its own kind. It's usually green in color, making it hard to be noticed when it has concealed itself in the grass or bush of flowers with varying colors. It's the most colorful and beautiful caterpillar we have ever seen, with no blemishes degrading its look. Because of its salient colors and hairy flower-like appearance, where the plants are green is its habitat environment, and also because it feeds on green plants. Their diet also includes lime, oak, hazel, birch, and elms. Although non-evergreen plants lose their beautiful appearance because of the changing seasons, the Pale Tussock Moth's seemingly resplendent spontaneous colors remain stagnant. The adults are sexually dimorphic, while the females are generally larger than the males and plain in form. They are common in England and Wales, and also found local in Ireland.
4. Sea Anemone
Sea Anemones are included in the class Anthozoa. They're close relatives of corals and jellyfish. Just like corals, when seen in the picture, the average person who doesn't know them could actually think they're plants. They were also named after the equally flashy terrestrial anemone flower. Although they look like plants, they're classified as animals. However, recent scientific studies revealed that they're also half plant and half animal. They have cylindrical bodies which are made of adhesive pedal discs, including arrays of branching tentacles surrounding their mouths. Their tentacles are filled with venom and have stingers that inject their paralyzing venom into the prey. The defenseless prey is dragged by their tentacles into their mouths.
Throughout the world's ocean at various depths, there are more than 1,000 sea anemone species that exist. The largest and most varied sea anemones occur in coastal tropical waters. Like their coral relatives, sea Anemones establish symbiotic relationship with green algae. They get food from the algae's photosynthesis; in exchange, the Anemones provide safe harbor for the algae, including exposure to sunlight.
3. Satanic Leaf-Tailed Gecko
We've learned about the enthralling beauty of animals similar to beautiful and colorful plants on this list; the satanic leaf-tailed gecko, however, is not pretty at all. But it does look very much like a plant. It's a small reptile with large eyes and a body that superbly mimics a dead leaf. What makes it unique is that it doesn't have a colorful and beautiful appearance. It is mottled brown, and some species have small black dots on the underside. Their entire bodies are twisted, with a veined skin and a tail that makes them look like they have been nibbled at by insects and rotted by decay. This strange appearance that they have helps them blend into the foliage of their habitat.
When it comes to avoiding predators, the satanic leaf-tailed gecko is an expert. Its leaf-like appearance is also included in their expertise of avoiding predatory animals. But there are other things they can do. Like one, for example, they can flatten their bodies against the substrate to reduce their shadows, including opening their jaws wide to show a frightening, bright red mouth, while shedding their tails to trick predators.
2. Sea Cucumber
Sea cucumbers are dwellers of the ocean, and some live in the shallow waters. Because of their name, if you're unfamiliar with these them, you could actually think they're cucumber vegetables that grow underwater, but they are not vegetables. They're omnivore animals that belong to the echinoderms family that include starfish and sea urchins. The name "sea cucumber" was given to them because they literally look like soft-bodied cucumbers. However, some species differ in shapes, appearance, and sizes, but most of them still look like cucumbers. Some species live near the bottom of the ocean, and some can partially bury themselves beneath it. Tiny particles of algae and minute aquatic animals are their diet, and sometimes they can also feed on waste materials. But they themselves are prey to fish and other aquatic animals, and they're also enjoyed by humans in Asia—where various species are farmed as delicacies. Their feet, which look like tentacles, are what they use to gather their food in their mouths.
1. Dendrogramma
Dendrogrammas are newly discovered mushroom-shaped alien-like animals. They were found in the collection of organisms dredged up during the 1980's at depths of 400-1,000 meters deep in the ocean of the south-east Australian continental slope. Only two species of these strange organisms were discovered, which scientists named Dendrogramma enigmatica and Dendrogramma discoides. They are made up of an outer skin and inner stomach separated by a thick layer of jellylike substance. It's suspected they might be related to ancient instinct life forms that lived 600 million years ago. Both two species have a single opening at the base of their stem where food goes in and waste material goes out. In the cap of these mushroom-like creatures, there's a gastrovascular tube that branches into a series of canals. They could not be categorized in any existing phylum, and they could represent a new, non-bilateral phylum in the kingdom "Animalia".
Now that we have two ocean-dwelling animals named after vegetables, namely "sea cucumbers" and the "sea mushrooms", perhaps researchers could discover sea cabbage-like animals and name them "sea cabbages".
