PERTH: The blue color and lovely texture of Blue Dragon gives it the appearance of a mystical bird.
Although it resembles a Pokémon or a Final Fantasy character; it is actually a rare sea slug named Glaucus Atlanticus, or commonly known as a blue dragon.
According to a scientist interviewed by Australia’s Gold Coast Bulletin, it’s a good thing that Fry didn’t try to touch the slug she saw, because it might have stung her. Lucinda Fry spotted the critter and posted a video of the encounter on Facebook on November 12, attracting thousands of views.
At just a few centimetres in length, the Blue Dragon is quite poisonous and can cause painful, even unsafe, stings to those who attempt to handle them.
The blue dragon not only clings to the Portuguese man o’ war’s tentacles, but can consume their toxic nematocyst cells and store them for later in little sacs to sting predators, the publication reported. The venom is concentrated in the tissue of Blue Dragon, which is then used by Blue Dragon for its own defense and to become more venomous than the man o’war.
The Blue Dragon, obviously, takes its blue underside, which camoflages it with the surface of the sea, on which it floats upside down.