In 2005 Dr. Annie Mercier was sent a strange video: sea cucumbers rolling around at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.
Sea cucumbers – sausage-shaped marine animals with soft, cylindrical bodies – can usually be found on the seafloor where they gather together in large herds. Suckers on their tube feet allow the animals to stick to the ocean floor as they crawl along in search of food.
“I thought it was weird behaviour for sea cucumbers, but figured a storm might have detached them from the seafloor, and then I forgot all about it,” said Dr. Mercier, professor, Department of Ocean Sciences, Faculty of Science.
“A few years later I was sent another video, this time of dozens sea cucumbers rolling around the seafloor off Nova Scotia.”
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Image via Memorial University of Newfoundland.