These tube-shaped animals are dark red with lighter orange or yellow conical papillae, which are stiff, spine-like structures on their body. They have 5 rows of tube feet on their underside.
Habitat
Coastal waters, from the low intertidal to depths of 820 feet, over a variety of substrates including mud, gravel, shell, or rock.
Diet
Deposit feeders: bacteria, fungi
Life History
California sea cucumbers reach sexual maturity when they are 9 inches long, at 4 years of age. They move to shallow waters in spring and summer, where they reproduce by broadcast spawning, rising partly up to release their orange eggs or white sperm strands into the water. The planktonic larvae feed on plankton for 35-125 days before settling to the seafloor.
They can grow to 20 inches and live up to 12 years.
IUCN Status
Not Evaluated
Ecosystem & Cultural Importance
The main predators of the California sea cucumber are the sunflower star and purple sun star, but they contribute to the diet of many species, including sea otters. A scale worm will sometimes live on the body of a California sea cucumber.
California sea cucumbers support a commercial fishery, but most are exported to Asia.
These cucumbers are important to their habitats because their deposit feeding disturbs the upper sediment layer, making it more permeable and increasing oxygen concentration for organisms living within the sediment. In addition, their fecal casts contain inorganic nitrogen and phosphorus which can be used by photosynthetic microalgae living on the sediment surface.
California sea cucumbers reach sexual maturity when they are 9 inches long, at 4 years of age. They move to shallow waters in spring and summer, where they reproduce by broadcast spawning, rising partly up to release their orange eggs or white sperm strands into the water. The planktonic larvae feed on plankton for 35-125 days before settling to the seafloor.
They can grow to 20 inches and live up to 12 years.
Haug, Lily. inches A Review of Current Sea Cucumber and Apostichopus californicus Knowledge and a Proposal for Future Research and Fishery Management.inches (2022).
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