A shrimp-like marine menace with a foot fetish.
The water-line isopods (Excirolana chiltoni) are flesh-eating bugs that are too small yet cause big pain to humans when bit. When bitten, experts say to rapidly shuffle the feet to reduce the aftereffects on the feet, but it does not eliminate the number of bites.
This new aquatic menace lives in the shallow waters of the Pacific, and migrates seasonally down the coast, causing beach travelers to hop in pain.
Adding to the list of marine menace on the US coastline, beachgoers in Southern California find it creepy as these bugs apparently acquired the flavor of human feet.
"It was painful," victim Tara Sauvage remembered the lingering pain on her foot while taking a walk along the beach in De Anza Cove in San Diego. She described the pain as shocking and said that she had blood all over her foot and between her toes.
The Biology and Natural History of Water-line Isopods
Walla Walla University in Washington's report said that this bug is actually a crustacean species that has a growing capacity of around 0.3 inches (0.8 centimeters) long and has the ability to form swarms of more than a thousand individuals.
They added that these nippers draw blood from barefoot waders' sandy feet. These isopods bury themselves under sand and actively scavenge for the dead animal matter.
But they seem to be especially enthusiastic in the shallow waters of retreating waves on sandy beaches.
A large number of these isopods may quickly congregate around an animal cadaver that washes in water and quickly stripped of flesh from dead animals.
They can be found year-round along the coastline of Canada and beaches in the Northwest Pacific regions of the US and Canada, but the biting incidents rarely happen consistently on a single coastline.
Richard Brusca, a former curator of crustaceans at the San Diego Natural History Museum and an invertebrate zoologist from the University of Arizona told Los Angeles Times, that the nipping crustaceans are "like mini-sharks" that can attack "like a wolf pack."
However, he said that there is an unclear cause for the sudden increase in the number of these water-line isopods.
Flesh-eating Bug Contribution to Marine Life
According to professor Ryan Hechinger of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, he told CBS8 that the flesh-eating bug contributes to the natural flow of the marine ecosystem.
"They eat dead fish so it doesn't stink in the water."
Freaking out can be the first reaction when people encounter the crustacean, but this is not recommended. He said to be just cautious and don't fret, "if it bugs you, get out."
They also contribute to the penned-in fish industry as they serve as a scourge in fish farms so the fish cannot escape.
The krill-like bugs rarely cause real damage to humans, in fact, Sauvage mentioned in the interview with CBS8, that she felt the pain for no more than 10-15 minutes.
Perhaps the dangerous one, is the water-line isopod's close relative, Cirolana harfordi, that is responsible for a bloody attack on Sam Kanizay's feet a teen wader from Melbourne, Australia back in 2017, where he initially mistook the bites as short sharp pins and needles, but when he left the waters, he saw that his feet have missing dots of skin, like if they had been flayed.
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