Volusia County, FL-Early today Beach Safety officers were reporting seeing Portuguese Man O' War jellyfish washing ashore on local beaches. A purple flag warning of dangerous marine life was posted to let beachgoers know.
Toll booth employees were also notified to let people know as they come to enjoy the beach.
From Wikipedia: . Its venomous
tentacles can deliver a painful (and sometimes fatal)
sting. Despite its outward appearance, the Portuguese man o' war is not a
jellyfish but a
siphonophore, which, unlike jellyfish, is not actually a single
multicellular organism, but a
colonial organism made up of specialized individual animals called
zooids or polyps.
[2] These zooids are attached to one another and physiologically integrated to the extent that they are unable to survive independently, and therefore have to function as if they were a so-called individual animal.
These jellyfish can deliver a painful and even dangerous sting.
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