Venomous Creatures Of The West Pacific

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radially symmetrical, lack specialized ecretory organs, and reproduce sexually. Echinoderms have the ability to regenerate lost or injured body parts.
Starfish:

Starfishes are free-living echinoderms that have a flat, star-shaped or pentagonal body, usually with a continuous disc that has five or more ray-like extensions called arms. Tube feet are located in an open furrow along the underside of the arms. These arms contain the digestive glands and genital organs. Located on the upper surface are many blunt, calcarous spines. The stomach is large and sac-shaped, the intestine minute, and the mouth tuns downwards. With the use of their tub feet, starfishes move about over the floor of the sea by slow, gliding movements. Usually the sucking discs are not used when walking over smooth bottom, but only when the starfish is climbing. Starfishes are voracious, for they eat other echinoderms, mollusks, and worms. It is believed that their habit of eating poisonous shellfish is ...

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enveloped in a thin layer of rugose integument. The spines may measure up to 6 cm or more in length, and tend to be somewhat less friable than their equivalent size in sea urchins.
Poisonous starfishes are believed to be toxic to eat. Contact with the slime of some species of asteroids may result in a contact dermatitis. In both cases the poison is thought to be produced by the glandular cells which are present in abundance in the epidermis of starfish.
Acanthaster planci is the only known venomous asteroid. The spines of this starfish are elongate, pungent, and covered by a venom-producing integument. Wounds produced by these spines can be extremely painful.
Contact with the ...

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