Green Hydra

In class we found green hydra in our pond water. According to what I have read, green hydra are common. However, after many, many hours and days of gazing at pond scum (one of my favorite things to do on a rainy day) I had never seen one. This one has a budding "baby" - they grow right out of the side of the "parent" and then pop off when they are big enough. They are clones of the parent - this is called asexual reproduction as opposed to the crayfish experience. Anyway, for those of you who don't know, hydra are related to jelly fish, corals and (my favorite) anemones. They have tentacles with the same kind of "stinging cells" that the others have but they are so small they really can't do any damage to you. These are green because they have a green friend. They have an algae that lives inside their tissues and makes food. So, if the hydra doesn't have any food they just have to be in the light and the algae makes the food. In turn, they provide the algae with a nice, safe house. Cool, huh? What if we had green friends. If we got hungry and didn't have any money we could just stand outside in the sun. But then, what would we miss? Steak? Chocolate? Maybe that's not such a good idea.