Category: Sponges view all from this category

Description Varies from a thin encrusting layer less than 1/8" (3 mm) high and covering a few square inches to 8" (20 cm) wide and 8" (20 cm) high with many fanlike branches. Red to orange. Pores inconspicuous.

Habitat On rocks, pilings, oysters and other shells, and hard objects in protected bays and estuaries; below low-tide line.

Range Nova Scotia to Florida and Texas; Washington to c. California.

Discussion The Red Beard Sponge was the first animal shown to reorganize its form from experimentally separated cells. Cells divided by squeezing the sponge through a fine mesh cloth into a bowl of sea water creep about on the bottom, stick to each other, and finally form a mass which reorganizes into a sponge. This sponge tolerates both the pollution and the reduced salinities of bays and estuaries.