We are today diving on a uh eastern peak area, an eastern
rich Caloosahatchee Seamount, an area called Vero Peak. Oh,
and here we see a sea star wrapped around one of these
primnoid whip corals. These are Calyptophora. So these sea
stars are predators of these deep sea corals and so they can
actually strip the polyps. This sea star really has a very good
grip on this very thin coral. It's kind of amazing when you
think that that thin coral can hold up the sea star. If you
actually look at the coral right next to it, you can see
it's kind of got this fuzzy texture and those are all the
polyps that are open but the one the sea star is on is not
very happy about it being there. They're all closed up.