What are some of the characteristics of a Portuguese man of war?

Answer 1

Portuguese man-of-war, a floating, compound marine animal found in warm regions of all oceans. It is made up of a colony of four kinds of polyps. There is a polyp that forms the gas-filled float, 8 to 10 inches (20 to 25 cm) long, which is usually iridescent blue with a pink crest. Below the float hang the food-catching, feeding, and reproductive polyps. The food-catching polyps form tentacles that may be more than 40 feet (12 m) long, with stinging parts that paralyze or kill most fish and other prey on contact.

They tentacles that have stinging cells called blastula and a nematocyst. It uses them to catch prey or protection. It paralyzes the prey and eats it in the medusa. They also have different polyps that digest the food that they eat. They also have polyps that have nitrogen in them so they can float up on surface of the sea. Also they have polyps that act like sails for the jellyfish to move. They have polyps that have stinging cells on them and they form tentacles so the can catch prey that are low in the sea in their tentacles. The Portuguese man of war's predators are the leather back turtle, the logger head turtle, also there is a nudbrae that latches on to the Portuguese mar of war and feeds on it and the toxin gets absorbed by the slug and uses it as self defense, and the pacific crab. The turtles have thick skin so the stinging cells can't get to them.

Also there are some small fish that feed on the polyps of the Portuguese man of war. And there is a blanket octopus that tears the tentacles off and uses that as defensive materials to protect them selves. If a prey touches or gets caught in the tentacles the prey would get paralyzed or maybe it could kill the prey. And the Portuguese man of war eats it. The nematocyst sting toxin secreted from the tentacles of the dactylozooids, a mixture of enzymes, is a neurotoxin about seventy-five percent as powerful as cobra venom. The toxins contain a complex mixture of polypeptides and proteins including catecholamines, histamine, hyaluronidase, fibolysins, kinins, phospholipases and various hemolytic, cardio toxic and dermatonecrotic toxins.

The life of the Portuguese man of war starts by the planula larvae which is reproduced by the adult. Then it becomes a polyp and turns into a strobila. Then it turns to a eyhra. Then it becomes a adult jellyfish. The Portuguese man of war reproduces sexually and asexually. It reproduces sexually intrusively by having the jellyfishes to exchange sperm for fertilizing the eggs in the jellyfish. It also reproduces asexually extusively by releasing eggs into the water and letting other jellyfish release sperm into the water to fertilize the eggs.

A Portuguese man of war doesn't have a brain, respiratory system. They absorb oxygen through diffusion, since they are about 95% water in composition as opposed to our 70%, so they need no respiratory or circulatory systems. Jellyfish have no brain or nervous system like that of more complex lifeforms, and instead possess a loose network of nerves on their outer skin that transmit information to a simple nerve ring in the center that responds to stimuli in very simple ways.

Answer 2

A Portuguese man-of-war is a marine creature that appears as a floating colony of individual organisms called polyps. It has a transparent, balloon-like float that can vary in color from blue to purple. It has long tentacles that can deliver a powerful sting, and it drifts at the mercy of ocean currents.