{"id":992,"date":"2021-11-23T09:57:31","date_gmt":"2021-11-23T09:57:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/?p=992"},"modified":"2021-11-23T09:59:28","modified_gmt":"2021-11-23T09:59:28","slug":"star-shaped-sand-found-in-japan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/?p=992","title":{"rendered":"Star-shaped sand found in Japan"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Take a stroll along <strong>Hoshizuna-no-Hama <\/strong>(Star Sand Beach), <strong>located <\/strong>on <strong>Iriomote Island<\/strong>, enjoying your feet submerge in the sand. <strong>Look closely<\/strong>, and you\u2019ll see that the <strong>sand <\/strong>on this <strong>beach <\/strong>is <strong>very special<\/strong>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/3434.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-994\" width=\"484\" height=\"345\" srcset=\"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/3434.jpg 920w, https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/3434-300x214.jpg 300w, https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/3434-768x548.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 484px) 100vw, 484px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The tiny <strong>star-shaped<\/strong> <strong>grains <\/strong>of sand you\u2019ll see on your feet are actually the pointy husks of millions of tiny <strong>Foraminifera<\/strong>, which are part of the same <strong>protist <\/strong>as <strong>amoeba<\/strong>. When <strong>Foraminifera <\/strong>die, the tide brings them ashore from coral reefs in the <strong>Western Pacific Ocean<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/31207.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-993\" width=\"492\" height=\"368\" srcset=\"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/31207.jpg 990w, https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/31207-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/31207-768x576.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 492px) 100vw, 492px\" \/><figcaption><span class=\"has-inline-color has-white-color\"> <strong>Foraminifera<\/strong> <\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The <strong>Foraminifera <\/strong>phylum includes some <strong>10,000 species <\/strong>that create shells of various designs. Star-shaped shells, such as the kind created by the\u00a0<em><strong>Baculogypsina sphaerulata<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0species shown here, are very rare.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/newmss-1024x701.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-995\" width=\"520\" height=\"356\" srcset=\"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/newmss-1024x701.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/newmss-300x205.jpg 300w, https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/newmss-768x526.jpg 768w, https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/newmss.jpg 1053w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 520px) 100vw, 520px\" \/><figcaption><span class=\"has-inline-color has-white-color\"><strong> Hoshizuna-no-Hama beach<\/strong><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Take a stroll along Hoshizuna-no-Hama (Star Sand Beach), located on Iriomote Island, enjoying your feet submerge in the sand. Look closely, and you\u2019ll see that the sand on this beach is very special. The tiny star-shaped grains of sand you\u2019ll see on your feet are actually the pointy husks of millions of tiny Foraminifera, which&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/?p=992\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Star-shaped sand found in Japan<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-992","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/992","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=992"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/992\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":999,"href":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/992\/revisions\/999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=992"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=992"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mermaidthea.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=992"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}