STARFISHES.

One of the most unique and interesting branches of the animal kingdom is

that division called by scientists Echinodermata, comprising animals

familiarly known as starfishes, sea urchins, sand dollars and sea

cucumbers. So far as is known no member of this group of animals has

ever ventured on land or into fresh water. All are inhabitants of the

ocean and are found from the tide-washed shore to the abysses of the

sea.

The present article deals with the true starfishes (Asteroidea) and a

good idea of the general structure may be gained by a careful

examination of a specimen of the common five-finger (Asterias vulgaris)

so common on the New England coast. It is made up of a central disk or

body, from which extend five rays or arms, whence the name starfish. The

animal is protected by a hard framework or skeleton, composed of many

limestone plates, attached by a tough membrane and covered with a skin.

Between these plates there are many small openings through which the

water enters the body cavity. The plates are armed with numerous spines,

attached by a ball and socket joint. Some of these spines bear little

pincer-like organs called pedicellariæ, which are capable of

considerable movement. Many of these little organs are arranged in

groups about the spines, which swell at the point of attachment to the

surface of the starfish, thus forming a shelf or base, around which

these organs arrange themselves in the form of a wreath, the spine

projecting high above the center. The exact function of these little

organs is not known, although they have been seen to catch small

animals, such as crustacea, and this is probably one of their duties.

The lower or actinal surface of each arm is deeply channeled and

perforated by many holes or pores, through which the little ambulacra or

water-feet are thrust. These serve as organs of locomotion, of

respiration and of perception. These water-feet form a part of the

wonderful water-vascular system, which consists of a madreporic body, or

sieve-like organ, opening on the dorsal or actinal surface and situated

between two rays. It opens into a tube called the stone canal, which

enters a circular vessel called the circum oral water tube, surrounding

the mouth, and a long radial canal, to which the water-feet are

attached, opens from this tube and extends along the inner surface of

each ray. The water enters the madreporic body, circulates through the

stone canal, the circular and radial tubes, and finds its exit through

the ambulacra. The water system is directed and controlled by a set of

nerves, extending from a ring of nerve matter surrounding the mouth.

The true vascular or blood system consists of a heart or hæmal canal,

which runs parallel with the stone canal from the madreporic body to the

oral water tube. A set of circular and radial vessels supplies every

part of the animal with the vital fluid.

The digestive system is simple and consists of a mouth, a stomach, which

is large and sends a lobe into the base of each arm, and an intestine of

greater or lesser length, ending in a small anal opening on the dorsal

surface. The cœca or liver consists of two long, tree-like masses,

nearly filling each ray and connecting with the stomach by a short duct.

Starfishes are very destructive to the oyster beds along the Atlantic

coast of the United States, thousands of bushels of oysters being

destroyed in a few days by them. The little starfishes attack the young

oysters and as the former increase in size they move about in vast

numbers, resembling in this respect the grasshoppers and locusts of the

west and being fully as destructive. In a paper in a Bulletin of the

United States Fish Commission, by Henry C. Rowe, it is stated that in

1882 $90,000 worth of oysters were destroyed in six months and $9,000

were spent in the same period in catching the starfishes. The method of

catching these animals is interesting. Devices called “tangles” and

“mops” are used. These consist of a heavy iron frame, to which about

twenty small ropes, ending in a large bunch of cotton waste, are

fastened. These “mops” are drawn over the oyster beds and the starfishes

become entangled in the waste and are then drawn on board the vessel. As

many as 1,500 starfish have been taken from a single “mop.”

The following account, published in the Evening Register, of New Haven,

Conn., April 3, 1884, will serve as an example of the destructive habits

of these animals: “It was reported yesterday that between November 1,

1883, and the close of navigation in December, there were caught on

oyster beds adjoining the Bridgeport public beds about 15,000 bushels of

starfish. Since October 1 they have destroyed over 900 acres. From six

to ten steamers have been catching starfish during the past six months,

at an expense of $5,000.”

When oystermen first knew of the destruction caused by the starfishes,

they spent much time and labor in collecting the injurious animals,

cutting off an arm or two and then throwing the mutilated body and

dismembered arms back into the water, not knowing that the arms would

grow out again. The animals are now collected and used as a fertilizer.

The interesting power of reproducing lost arms is well illustrated on

the plate, the individual figured having one perfect arm and four new

ones just starting to grow.

The method of eating among some of the common starfishes is curious.

When the shell of an oyster is too large to be swallowed, the starfish

actually projects its stomach from its mouth, surrounds the shell with

this everted organ, and digests its prey in this position. The sight

presented in an aquarium by a number of these animals in this attitude

is truly wonderful and odd. Another interesting performance of a member

of this group is that of righting itself when placed on its back. This

is performed in the following manner: One or more of the rays is twisted

about until the sucking feet get a firm hold on the ground or the object

upon which it is resting; this is followed by a succession of similar

movements farther back in the row of ambulacra, so that the whole ray is

finally twisted around and lies flat on the ground. The other arms then

turn in a similar manner and the starfish is soon “right side up.”

Though hidden away in dark corners of the sea, the starfish is able to

see, being quite well supplied with visual organs. The end of each ray

is slightly turned up and at its summit is situated a little red eye. A

long nerve extends from this eye-spot to the ring of nerve matter which

surrounds the mouth.

The Atlantic and Pacific coasts abound in several species of interesting

starfishes, several of which are illustrated on the plate. The most

numerous of these is the common five-finger (Asterias forbesii), found

abundantly on the shores of the New England states. This animal loves to

hide among the rocks and seaweed, and a search at low tide will always

reveal a host of them. Along the sandy shores of Narragansett Bay they

may be collected at low water among the seaweed, where they feed upon

bivalve mollusks, such as cockles, arks and clams.

One of the largest and handsomest of the starfishes is the Giant

Mountain Starfish (Oreaster reticulatus), so common in the waters of the

Bahama Islands. This species attains a diameter of fifteen or sixteen

inches and is very high in the center. Its upper surface is reticulated

by the crossing of the hard parts of the skeleton, and beautiful

ornaments may be made by removing the softer parts and leaving only the

skeleton, which forms a peculiarly latticed framework. This species is

found on both sides of the Atlantic ocean; it is a common starfish in

the West Indies, inhabits the coast of the United States from Florida to

South Carolina and is abundant on the shores of the Cape Verde Islands.

The most common starfish of the Pacific coast is the Ochre-colored

Starfish (Asterias ochracea), which ranges from Sitka, Alaska, to San

Diego, California, the last mentioned locality being one of the best. It

is a large species, frequently attaining a diameter from tip to tip of

the arms of sixteen inches. When alive it is of a rich ochre color or

brown, and the surface is beautifully reticulated by numerous

club-shaped spines arranged in rows. This species is as much an enemy to

the oysters of the Pacific coast as is the common five-finger to those

of the Atlantic coast.

Another common starfish of the coast of California is the Vermilion

Starfish, which may be collected by thousands at San Diego and Monterey.

The body is very broad and the rays short and wide. It is in shape quite

suggestive of the foot of a pelican or duck. The upper surface is beset

with small, heavy spines, which are arranged in little festoons on the

five rays. Its name is very appropriate, for it is of a rich vermilion

color, varying from this to rose, yellowish or purple.

A starfish of peculiar design and startling aspect is the Armed Starfish

(Nidorella armata), which is an inhabitant of the warm waters of the

Isthmus of Panama. It is like a star in form, the rays being short and

wide. The edge is bordered by large, squarish plates and the upper

surface is marked by many little holes, giving it the aspect of a fine

sieve. But the most peculiar ornamentation and the character from which

the species derives its name is the row of long, cornucopia-shaped

spines which extend along the center of each ray from the tip to the

center of each disk. Besides this regular row of spines there are

several projecting from the surface of the starfish between the rays.

Taken as a whole, the dorsal surface is not unlike a miniature African

shield.

During the past twenty years many interesting and curious forms of

starfishes have been dredged by the United States Fish Commission

Steamer Albatross, in deep water, off the eastern coast of America. Some

of the species were the common forms found along the shore, such as the

common five-finger (Asterias vulgaris), which ranges from low water to

two hundred eight fathoms. But the majority were species new to science,

which were brought up from a maximum depth of two thousand three hundred

sixty-nine fathoms, a depth of about three miles.

One can hardly realize the difficulties attending the gathering of these

animals from such a depth. Let us imagine that a dredge is dropped from

the top of the Masonic Temple, in Chicago, a height of about two hundred

and seventy feet, and drawn along the street to catch such insects,

mollusks and other life as might be there. It is manifest that only a

small percentage of the fauna would be represented by such a method. The

depth mentioned is only forty-five fathoms, and if there is difficulty

in securing a representative collection for this moderate distance, what

must be the almost insurmountable obstacles when that distance is

multiplied fifty times. With all these difficulties, however, the

animals of the abysses of the ocean are being collected and classified.

Frank Collins Baker.

THE FIRE-WEED OR GREAT WILLOW-HERB.

(_Chamaenerion angustifolium._)

Scattered throughout the world, but more abundant in the temperate

regions of America, there are three hundred and fifty species of plants

that are closely related and grouped by the botanist as the evening

primrose family. By him this family is called the Onagraceæ, possibly

derived from two Greek words, meaning wine and a hunt or eager pursuit.

The Greek name is supposed, by some authorities, to have been applied to

a plant a portion of which when eaten would develop a taste for wine.

Even now the roots of some species are used in scenting wine. The word

may also be derived from the Greek word meaning the ass, and used here

because many of the species bear elongated, erect and pointed leaves

resembling the ears of that animal.

This family includes a number of interesting plants. Here are classed

the fuchsias or ladies’ eardrops, of which there are many brilliant

varieties under cultivation as house plants. These are natives of the

mountain regions from Mexico southward. Another cultivated plant is the

Clarkia, a native of Oregon and California.

Among the more common wild species are the evening primroses, the

willow-herbs and the enchanter’s night-shade, named Circaea in honor of

Circe, the enchantress. Why Linnæus should have chosen this plant with

which to honor Circe is difficult to understand, for the Circaea is an

insignificant plant of the woods.

The Fire-weed is one of the most interesting of the wild members of the

family. It is abundant in dry fields and along roadsides throughout that

portion of North America lying north of North Carolina, Kansas, Arizona

and California. With its spike-like racemes of rather broad purple or

sometimes white flowers, it beautifies many waste places from the

Atlantic to the Pacific coast. A plant of the Fire-weed is a continuous

bouquet, for it blossoms from June to October. The flowers are followed

by attractive fruits which are long and slender and when ripe split into

four sections, thus releasing the numerous seeds which have a tuft of

long cottony hairs by means of which they are wafted by the wind to long

distances. Many of these seeds fall where the conditions are not

favorable for growth, but they retain their vitality for a long time.

The Fire-weed is a plant of the open country and not of the forest. It

must have a great deal of sunshine. When its seeds fall in the deep

shade of a dense forest, where the rays of the sun penetrate but a short

distance if at all, they cannot grow. But let the woodman or a fire lay

low or destroy the noble growth of trees, then there is soon a

transformation—the landscape is enlivened by the bright flowers of the

Fire-weed. Where the northern coniferous forests have been burned, it is

not an uncommon sight to see a Fire-weed plant, from six to ten feet

tall, with its broad top of flowers closely contrasted with the

blackened remains of a forest monarch. The Fire-weed is an excellent

illustration of the perfect provision that is found in Nature for the

perpetuation of the species. Its seeds are distributed by both animate

and inanimate forces. They are dropped on both favorable and unfavorable

soil. If on the latter, their structure is such that the little embryo

plant within the seed can lie dormant for a long time. The deep forest

is an unfavorable soil for the seed of the Fire-weed, but remove the

trees and it can find no better home.

[Illustration: SEA OR MARSH PINK.

(Sabbatia stellaris).

FIRE-WEED.

(Chamaenerion angustifolium).

FROM “NATURE’S GARDEN”

COPYRIGHT 1900, By DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY]

THE SEA OR MARSH PINK.

(_Sabbatia stellaris._)

The Sea or Marsh Pink, or the Rose of Plymouth, as it is frequently

called, is a member of the beautiful gentian family. The genus Sabbatia,

a name adopted in honor of an Italian botanist, includes about fourteen

species, all natives of eastern North America and Mexico.

Our illustration is taken from “Nature’s Garden” and Neltje Blanchan,

its author, writes as follows regarding those species of the marsh pinks

that are confined to the vicinity of the Atlantic ocean: “Three

exquisite members of the Sabbatia tribe keep close to the Atlantic coast

in salt meadows and marshes, along the borders of brackish rivers, and

very rarely in the sand at the edges of fresh-water ponds a little way

inland. From Maine to Florida they range, and less frequently are met

along the shores of the Gulf of Mexico so far as Louisiana. How bright

and dainty they are! Whole meadows are radiant with their blushing

loveliness. Probably if they consented to live far away from the sea,

they would lose some of the deep, clear pink from out their lovely

petals, since all flowers show a tendency to brighten their colors as

they approach the coast.

“The Sea or Marsh Pink, whose graceful alternate branching stem attains

a height of two feet only under most favorable conditions, from July to

September opens a succession of pink flowers that often fade to white.

The yellow eye is bordered with carmine. They measure about one inch

across, and are usually solitary at the ends of branches, or else sway

on slender peduncles from the axils.”

This plant is frequently called the American Centaury, but it is not the

plant of which Pliny wrote these words: “Centaury, it is said, effected

a cure for Chiron (the Centaur), on the occasion when, while handling

the arms of Hercules, his guest, he let one of his arrows fall upon his

foot: hence it is said that by some it is called ‘Chironion.’” Botanists

are practically agreed that the plant mentioned by Pliny was a species

of the genus Centaurea, so well represented in this country by the

bachelor’s-button of our gardens.