Specimen F 239249 Bryozoan, Triphyllozoon moniliferum (MacGillivray, 1860)

Summary

Bryozoa are sometimes called lace corals but are quite unrelated to true corals, which are classified with sea jellies and sea anemones. Bryozoans are aquatic, mostly marine, invertebrates that form colonies of many diverse and beautiful shapes and they are much more conspicuous in cooler seas where true corals are far less common. They are tiny animals that form colonies. Individual zooids in the colonies are often specialised for different functions, including breeding, feeding or defense. Colonies form many different shapes. Most form thin crusts only one zooid thick over surfaces. Others form large skeletal, bushy or fan-shaped structures to raise the zooids away from the bottom. These colonies often appear superficially similar to a coral but despite the similarity in shape they are very distantly related.

It is not known where or when this specimen was collected.