- alright, i'm gonnaslowly move this rock out of the way and see if i can get him up closefor the cameras. here we go. ah! ah, look at that pincher. oh, he's trying to get me. i'm gonna let go ofthat arm right there. oh, look at that, look at that.
- [cameraman] can you showme the top side of him? (screams) (dramatic music) - as the morning sunrose above the horizon, i sat and watched as thetide slowly began to recede. one wave at a time,the shoreline gradually exposed itself, revealinga slippery obstacle course of rocky terrain. welcome to the pacificside of costa rica,
where if you arrive at low tide and know the rightplaces to search, the ecosystem is alivewith sea creatures. check this out! looks like i'm sittingat the edge of a river, but this is in fact,a tide going back out into the ocean. now, i know youguys often wonder how do you find thecreatures in beyond the tide.
we wait for the tide to go out, and then we backtrack intothe small tidal pools, and that's where you findanimals that are stranded. alright, let's head up this way to see what we can find. my favorite thingabout ocean tide pools is that you neverknow what you're going to come across. and our firstdiscovery of the day
was one of thestrangest creatures we have ever stumbled upon. oh, my gosh, lookat how big it is. - [cameraman] oh, what is that? - [coyote] that is an animal, that is a zebraworm right there. it is alive, i canfeel it contracting. look, now it looksmore like a worm. - [cameraman] thatis a huge worm.
is that as big as they get? - oh, they get bigger than that. they can stretch upto 50 times in length. look at that, lookat how far that thing stretches out! it just keeps going! - [cameraman] i feellike it's gonna break. - it's getting even bigger! look at that!
whoa! wow, okay. alright, i'm putting thisguy back under his rock. moving carefullydown the shoreline, our goal is to trackthe receding tide so that we could stay as close to the ocean as possible. these freshly exposedpools are generally cooler in temperature, which inturn, increases the chances
of finding sea life. and it wasn't longbefore we had our next animal encounter. oh, wow! look at this pocket of water, it's completely filledwith little slugs. you know what these are? these are warty sea cats. it'll be a lot easierfor you to see them
if we get some water inthis plastic container. now, we've shown youguys the black sea hare and the brown sea hare, and this is also avariety of sea slug, but they're a littlebit different. oh, they're everywhere! they're like on thesides of the rocks! come on, guys, i'm justgonna collect you up and put you in this container.
- [cameraman] a lot of slugs. - that is a container of slugs. see how quickly i wasable to collect 'em. they're probablyabout 60 or 70 of them right in this pocket. and look at that, youcan 'em so much better now that they're inthis clear container, but they're unbelievablycamouflaged on this algae, and that's actually whatthey are feeding on.
now, similar tothe brown sea hare and the black sea hare, they also have rhinophoreswhich are those little appendagesthat are growing up off of the top of their heads and right up fronton their mouths, now, the ones on topsense light and movement, and the ones on thefront of the face sense chemicals inthe environment,
specifically food andit also helps them to communicate with each other. now, you're maybewondering to yourself, do these creatureshave skeletons. no, they do not. slugs are actuallygastropods which means that they have a shell thatprotects their organs. now, something like a snailhas an external shell, but slugs like thisor the brown sea hare,
the black sea harehave an internal shell and i can actuallyfeel that in there, it feels like a little pebble and that is where allof its major organs are being kept. oh, look at the bottom of it. that's its foot right there. has a big muscle thathelps it slink along on the base into the tide pool.
and up front, it does havea scratchy little tongue called a radula, andthat's what they're using to almost vacuum cleanerup all of this algae. now, all you have todo is massage the slug a little bit, and it's getting extremelyslimy and very gummy. wow, oh, it'sunbelievably sticky, and the more i handle it, themore it secretes this mucus. now, it doesn'tinjure the animal
in any way to do this, that's actually helpingkeep it's body moist, and of course it'sthinking, "uh oh, "am i going to be eaten?" if so, that mucusis slightly toxic. it's not gonna harm me at all, but look at how theslug just slinks along in my hand. i didn't think wewere gonna come across
a slug way outhere in costa rica, ut sure enough nomatter where you go, we're always comingacross slugs. alright, let's keepheading this way and see what else we can find. - [cameraman] what yousee in there, coyote? - [coyote] a prettyangry-looking crab. look at how he's wedgedhis body into this rock. he's defending himselfwith that pincher,
look at that. alright, i'm gonnaslowly move this rock out of the way andsee if i can get him up close for the cameras. ah, ah! look at that pincher. now, the pinchers onthe front of this crab are pretty serious. if you can see, that'sa monster pincher.
this may be somevariety of stone crab. oh, oh, he's trying to get me. - oh, he got me good! look at that, look at my finger. he just crunched thetop of my finger. that really hurt! oh, my gosh! oh, that puts a purpleshore crab to shame. i think at this juncture,he has definitely earned
the right to bedefended in that corner. my finger is bleeding, let's just move onand see what else we can find here in thesecosta rican tide pools. ouch! this is perfect. - [cameraman] where,what do you see? - all of this, right here. now, all of these rocksare very flippable.
i have a feeling if westart flipping some, we're gonna findexactly what it is that we've been looking for. okay, this could be agreat rock right here. you can see that it'sslightly above the water, yet a lot of it's under. now, creature wannastay in the shade where it's cooler. a lot of crevicesup underneath this.
i'm gonna flip it, andlet's see what's under it. you ready? - [cameraman] yup. - [coyote] oh, yes, right there! alright, hold on. you know what those are? - [cameraman] they looklike hairy octopus. - [coyote] they do, oh! you think i should pick it up?
- [cameraman] i don't know. is it safe? - [coyote] looks likeit's probably dangerous with all of thosespines on the tentacles, but, these are infact brittlestars. this is actually oneof the most common tide pool species you will find. over 2,000 speciesof these worldwide and they can be found inevery single ocean system,
even the north and south pole, those frigid waters arehome to brittle stars. you may be thinkingto yourself, well, it kind of lookslike a caterpillar that has a bunchof spikes on it. is this venomous,is it poisonous? coyote, are you in anysort of danger right now? actually, the brittlestaris completely harmless. now, on the underside,they have little
tiny tube feet, verysimilar to a sea star. - [cameraman] now,they're not sea stars. - no, but they arerelated to sea stars. and right there in themiddle, that's its mouth. but not only is that its mouth, it's also its butt. they eat and excretetheir waste from the exact same hole. now, the jaws of thiscreature are very unique.
it actually has fivejaws, kind of like my fingers there, chomp, chomp, chomp, chomp. and as they're movingacross the basin of the tide pool, they're feasting onall sorts of algae and decomposing plant matter. and when the tide isgoing out like this, these creatures can actuallymove rather quickly.
watch this part, i'll putit right here in the algae and watch it move. really cool theway that they can just kind of adhereto the environment and then slink downin between the rocks. now, let's talk about theappendages of this creature. you see all of thesebristles that run down the length of the tentacles. those are actuallyused in locomotion,
and you can see they completelysurround the tentacle which allows this creatureto be very ambidextrous as it moves through thetide pool environment. now, this creatureis capable of losing except for one of its legs. now, a sea star canlose all of its legs and most species doregenerate their limbs, but, this guy, as longas he's get one leg, he's gonna be just fine.
well, between thecrab, the slugs and this brittlestar,i would definitely say that we have come acrosssome bizarre creatures here in the costarican tide pools. i'm coyote peterson, be brave, stay wild, we'll see you onthe next adventure! alright, buddy, backunder the rocks you go. that was cool.
if you thought thesecosta rican tide pool creatures were fascinating, make sure to go back and watch the first episodeof beyond the tide where we get up closewith a deadly sea snake. and don't forget, subscribe so you can join me and the crew on our next aquatic adventure! oh, cool, check this out,we got a little cove!
this could be the perfectspot to find creatures. come on up. - [cameraman] it'sreally slippery. - [coyote] good, yeah,watch your footing. - [cameraman] okay. - [coyote] alright,going down in there. oh, there's an eel!
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