Hydras are awesome dancers, they are flexible in many ways and I could never get tired to take pictures of all bizarre shapes and forms they take. Though in my previous hydra post I published some pictures, the majority were left out.
There are at least two hydras on these pictures, a thinner one which you see above and a bigger one which was on the first pic and in the previous post.
I found it strange at first that they vary in number of tentacles so much.However, the length of the tentacles and the extent to which they are tangled gives more impression that the number itself.
The one above showing its mouth, although it's sealed and invisible.
The one below caught a tiny water flea and is ready to consume it
They can catch animals of various sizes, even those that are much bigger than the hydras themselves.
The violet artifacts in the background are due to imperfect aliment of my "flash system" that consisted of two flashes that fired from different angles (even from below) and operated by two people. I wish cameras did not have this annoying pre-flash which made impossible using flashes in slave mode... I know there's such thing as synchronizer, but I need to get one first.
Overall, I took hundreds of shots, but few of them were interesting enough to get a place in this post.
Hydras are often covered with ciliates (Kerona pediculus). These tiny guys consume leftovers being perfectly protected by their stingy and poisonous big friends. Sometimes they remind me of squirrels on palm trees, and whenever I take pictures they are always behind the hydra. In the shot above two got in focus.
And the one below bows asking for applause for the dance show:
Now a quiz: how many ciliates did you spot on all the pictures in the post?
p.s. many thanks to my friends who were operating the flashes so I could do this set.
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