Strange transparent sea creature pulled from waters off New Zealand

What is this strange-looking creature? It looks like something molded from jelly at a creature effects shop in Hollywood, or maybe some creature from a lost undersea world.

Whatever it is, according to the UK Daily Mail, it was plucked from the waters off the northern tip of New Zealand, by fisherman Stewart Fraser, who was out on the water with his two sons, Conaugh and Finn.

"I was in two minds whether to haul it in, but curiosity got the better of me and I decided to take a closer look," he told the Daily Mail. "It felt scaly and was quite firm, almost jelly like, and you couldn't see anything inside aside from this orange little blob inside it."

Fraser said that neither he, his sons, nor any of his friends had any idea what it was.

[ More Geekquinox: Despite current Arctic chills, 2013 was 4th warmest year on record ]

However, one possible explanation has surfaced. According to Deborah Cracknell, the lead researcher at the National Marine Aquarium in Plymouth, UK, it could be a Salpa maggiore.

Salpas, or just salps, are remarkable creatures. Their transparency acts as a defense mechanism in the water, concealing them from predators, but it's when they encounter plankton blooms (which is what they eat) that their true extraordinary ability comes into play.

When plankton is plentiful, these little guys start to feed, straining the sea water through their body to suck in their continuous meal. While they do this, they bud off clones from their body, which grow at a fantastic rate, apparently faster than any other multi-cellular organism we know of. They continue to produce these clones, forming a long chain of them, until the food source is completely used up. Some call them the 'vacuum cleaners of the sea'.

(H/T to GrindTV and UKDailyMail)

Geek out with the latest in science and weather.
Follow @ygeekquinox on Twitter!