Identification - what are my zoas attached to?

[anon3674466]

Those red things expand and retract and seem to release stuff sometimes. Any ideas what that is? Sorry if this isn’t the right place to post this.

 

[WV Reefer]

Those red things expand and retract and seem to release stuff sometimes. Any ideas what that is? Sorry if this isn’t the right place to post this.

Looks like a Tunicate

 

[Tired]

It looks like a tunicate/sea squirt. A filter-feeding animal. Completely harmless to your aquarium. It may eventually die if it doesn't get enough food, so if you give the tank any sort of very fine food like reef roids, you might consider squirting a little at it now and then.

 

[anon3674466]

It looks like a tunicate/sea squirt. A filter-feeding animal. Completely harmless to your aquarium. It may eventually die if it doesn't get enough food, so if you give the tank any sort of very fine food like reef roids, you might consider squirting a little at it now and then.

Awesome, thanks! I honestly didn’t know, I thought it was a part of the zoas itself until I mentioned it to thelocal place I buy from and they were very confused what I was talking about (didn’t take a pic to show them).

 

[Tired]

They're actually a very cool animal. Tunicates are chordates, like us. That means they're animals that have a notochord, a simple spinal cord, at some point in their life. Tunicates are sort of tadpole-like as babies, then, as they mature, glue themselves into something and morph into what you're looking at right now.
That right there is our closest non-vertebrate relative. Even though we seem to have more in common with something like a crab (since a crab at least has limbs and moves around), we're more closely related to other chordates, which are those and lancelets. A lancelet is sort of like a boneless fish.