Calcareous marine worm tubes on a flotsam hub cap

Epibiont encrustations on flotsam plastic

Epibiont encrustations from flotsam plastic

Mostly the keeled calcareous tubes of the Serpulid marine polychaete worm Pomatoceros triqueter with a few empty acorn barnacle shells and seameats or Bryozoans. These epibiont organisms had colonised an old plastic car hub cap that eventually washed up as flotsam on the beach. The animals themselves had long vacated the shells and tubes that remained encrusted on the plastic.

3 Replies to “Calcareous marine worm tubes on a flotsam hub cap”

Jody says:

February 8, 2014 at 2:51 pm

Very interesting, very cool! Mother Nature’s work of art.

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winderjssc says:

February 8, 2014 at 3:05 pm

Thanks, Jody. Yes, these tubes decorate many kinds of natural objects as well as man-made artefacts. These calcareous tubes used to be referred to as “German writing” because they were supposed to look like Gothic script when they occurred in lesser densities on objects – but I think they look more like scribbling.

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Jody says:

February 9, 2014 at 1:18 pm

That’s an interesting tidbit! I had never heard the “German writing” angle.

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