Tag: Stingers

There is a common belief that certain creatures are insentient blobs, twitching unconsciously at the ends of the strings of their biological predispositions. We suspect insentience in many of the more primitive creatures, the liver fluke for instance, or slime mould, but the poster child for the “insentient blob” in the common understanding, are jellyfish.

There are many types of marine animal that are referred to as “stingers”. These include of course the Box Jellyfish and many true jellyfish, as well as Hydroids like the “Man o’ War”, and an assortment of creatures that actually nip and bite but whose effect is generally sting-like as far as your hide is concerned.

With stinger nets back in place on our local beaches, attention turns once again to the “stinger season”. In a promising development, researchers from James Cook University in Cairns have demonstrated, for the first time, the potential for off-the-shelf drones to be used to detect these deadly box jellyfish.