Fish of the Day 59 - I have shingles

Today's fish of the day is the shingle urchin! The name of this entry was, thankfully, a joke.

This entry is gonna be pretty short, but I have more planned for tomorrow. Stay tuned!

Shingle urchin facts:

- The reason why they have no spines is because they have adapted to their environment, which has very strong waves. They live in wave impact zones, where water crashes regularly against rocks with immense strength. This could break off their spines, so they instead have hard, armour-like plates! These plates wont break off, and won't create resistance against the water. Additionally, the elongated plates near the bottom of the urchin helps keep it attached to the rocks. Another factor that helps them stick to rocks are their sticky tube feet! The plates help stop waves sweeping them from underneath, but their sticky, suction-cup esque feet help to withstand the constant waves. The armor only goes so far!

- If you wanted the details, these urchins are able to withstand water velocities of 27.5 m/s... wind with the same velocity can uproot trees, so that should give you an idea of their strength.

- In hawaiian, these urchins are known as hāʻukeʻuke, or kaupali, which translates to "cliff-clinging", which references their tendancy to stick to ledges.

- They are rather small, but some can grow to the size of a football. Impressive for an urchin!

Do you have shingles as well? I think these urchins are very pretty. Not too interesting, but super unique looking, and thats good enough for me. Anyway, a small theory: if they live in such intense conditions with all those waves, and the spines of an urchin are usually to defend themselves from predators... do they really need those spines anyway? I mean, it's not like anything else is out to get them (other than the waves). I can't imagine many big, scary sea creatures live in the same area, so I think their only predators would be themselves...