10 June, 2010

The starfish

The starfish is a creature of the sea. As its name suggests, its body is shaped like a star. It usually has five arms joined to the central part of its body. Some starfish have more than five arms. If an arm gets broken off, it simply grows back another one.

The starfish can be grey, blue, green or purple in colour. The largest starfish ever caught was nearly one metre across the arms. The smallest starfish ever caught is less than one centimetre across. There are altogether about 2,000 kinds of starfish in the world today.

A starfish usually eats snails, shells, worms, corals, crabs and fish. Did you know that a female starfish can lay about three million eggs within two hours? The eggs hatch to become millions of young starfish larvae. Many of the young starfish become food for other fishes. A small number survive to become adult starfish.

The most famous starfish of all is the crown-of-thorns starfish. Its body is covered by a thick layer of spiky thorns. Sometimes they grow to such huge numbers that they destroy a large part of the coral reef that they live in. So, often, they have to be removed before they do irreparable damage to the reef.

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