Newly described ‘parasol’ sponges are graceful but deadly (to small crustaceans)

When most people think of sponges, they think of squishy, soap-filled kitchen sponges, or perhaps the graceful barrel sponges that grow around coral reefs. But in the dark depths of the ocean, some sponges have evolved into deadly predators, which trap and digest small, helpless prey. In a new paper in the journal Zootaxa, marine biologists describe three new species of predatory sponges that live in deep water off the coast of California and in the Gulf of California.