Of course a hammer and chisel are necessary for the removal of these corals, but they are hardy creatures, and may be kept for a considerable time in captivity. Their habits, too, are particularly interesting, and two or more may sometimes be found with skeletons attached, suggesting that branched arrangement so common in many of the corals from warmer seas.
Another of these stony corals (Balanophyllia regia) is shown on the same plate. It is much smaller than the last species, but exceedingly pretty. It is also much less abundant, being confined almost exclusively to the coast of North Devon, and is seldom seen far above the lowest ebb of the tide.
Fig. 101.—Caryophyllia cyathus
Our few brief descriptions of British anemones and corals have been confined to those species which appear in our coloured plates, but we have interspersed here and there between the text a few illustrations which will assist in the identification of other species and also help to show what a rich variety of form is exhibited by these beautiful creatures. Some of these inhabit deep water only and are consequently beyond the reach of most sea-side observers during the ordinary course of their work; yet they may often be seen in fishing villages, especially in the south-west, where they are frequently brought in among the haul of the trawlers, attached either to shells or stones; and live specimens of these deep-sea anemones may even be seen on the shells of whelks and bivalve molluscs in the fishdealers’ shops of London and other large towns.
Fig. 102.—Sagartia parasitica
One of the species in question—the Parasitic Anemone (Sagartia parasitica) is generally found on the shell of the whelk or some other univalve; and, if removed from its chosen spot, it will again transfer itself to a similar shell when an opportunity occurs. This interesting anemone is usually seen among the dredgings of the trawler, but may be occasionally met with on the rocky coasts of the south-west, at extreme low-water mark. Though sometimes seen attached to stones, shells may undoubtedly be regarded as constituting the natural home of the species, and many regard the former position as accidental or merely temporary, and denoting that the animal had been disturbed and removed from its favourite spot, or that circumstances had recently rendered a change of lodgings necessary or desirable. Further, the shell selected by this anemone is almost always one that is inhabited by a hermit crab; and this is so generally the case that the occasional exceptions to the rule probably point to instances in which the occupant of the shell had been roughly ejected during the dredging operations.