Black sea cucumber
Holothuria atra
Leopard Sea Cucumber
Bohadschia argus
About
This sea cucumber's yellow-spotted back gives it a leopard-like pattern, and it can grow up to 60 cm long, though most reach about 36 cm.
- Length
- 36 cm · max 60 cm
- Weight
- max 2.2 kg
- Depth
- 2–10 m
How to tell it apart
Several sea cucumbers in this genus look alike, and this species can even interbreed with one of them. The reliable mark is the pattern: a dense scatter of yellow eyespots across a grey-brown back, rather than plain skin or large blotches.
Appearance
Like other sea cucumbers, it has a roughly cylindrical body with a tough, leathery outer skin. Its back is greyish-brown and covered in numerous yellow eyespots, while the underside is usually paler, though some individuals are uniformly brown all over. Rows of tube feet on the underside are used for crawling. A ring of paddle-shaped, white-fringed black feeding tentacles surrounds the mouth at the front end. If disturbed, it can eject sticky, toxic threads called Cuvierian tubules from its rear end to deter predators.
Habitat
It lives in shallow tropical waters of the eastern Indian Ocean and western Pacific, commonly on exposed sandy areas around coral reefs, reef flats and slopes, and outer lagoons, at depths of 2 to 30 m, mostly in the shallower end of that range.
Did you know?
It can carry pearlfish living inside its body, entering tail-first through its rear opening. In one study, 15 pearlfish were found sharing the inside of a single one of these sea cucumbers.
Log it in Into the Blue
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