On Monday, the man shared a photo of the bizarre animal he discovered on a Fremantle beach on Facebook.
“ID on this alien looking thing that washed on Leighton Beach,” he wrote.
One man, who appeared to know what the thing was, advised anyone who saw it to “get a plastic bag and throw it away”.
A man found this creature on WA’s Leighton Beach – but do you know what it is? Source: Facebook
It turns out that the organism in issue is a sea hare. This has also been confirmed by experts to Yahoo News Australia.
When alarmed, the organism emits purple color, according to Professor Culum Brown of Macquarie University’s Department of Biological Sciences.
“They are mildly toxic … depending on the algae they have been eating,” Professor Brown said.
Dimitris Siskopoulos/Flickr
In October, a Queensland woman discovered a sea hare on a beach north of Brisbane.
The Indo-Pacific Ocean is home to 23 different species of sea hares. Adults can weigh up to 14kg when fully grown.
Sea hares, like octopi, can employ ink, although they use it as a defense strategy rather than to evade prey. Toxins are included in the ink.
It’s believed this ink can be poisonous to dogs.
Swans Veterinary Services associate veterinarian Dr Joshua Ovens told the Esperance Express that anyone who suspects their dog has eaten a sea hare should contact a veterinarian right once.
“In terms of clinical signs, if your dog has licked or eaten one, they’ll tend to drool excessively, they can get muscle spasms and begin shaking, vomiting and it can progress to seizures and possible death if they get a really large dosage,” he told the paper in 2018.
Dr. Ovens, on the other hand, claims that some dogs are “more susceptible to it” than others, and that some sea hares produce more toxins than others.
“It’s difficult to tell how much is too much in terms of exposure to it,” he said.
