Starfish are important to the marine world. They’re beneficial in many ways and beautiful. There are many reasons why starfish are so significant, you will find fifteen reasons why starfish are important.
Starfish is a common name for these marine creatures because they have five arms or rays on each body that resemble stars. It can regenerate their arms. These starfish are omnivores, feeding on small fish and various types of algae, sponges, and mollusks.
For those who do know starfish and find it scary and dangerous. This article will share fifteen reasons why starfish are important.
15 Benefits Of Starfish That Make Them Even Cuter
There are about 1,500 known species of starfish and they can be found in oceans all over the world. Most of their species live near coral reefs or sandy shores where they feed on mollusks and other small sea creatures.
Japan is well known for its love for sea creatures, it has been suggested that starfish should be the national animal of Japan. Here we count down 15 different reasons that will show everyone why starfish are important.
1. Starfish Are Important For Keeping Diversity
Starfish are important because they are crucial for keeping biodiversity. Having more biodiversity benefits the environment by increasing an ecosystem’s stability, productivity, genetic variability, and ability to adapt. A healthy environment is an important part of a healthy planet.
2. Starfish Keep The Food Chain Balanced
Starfish play an important role in keeping marine food chains intact since they are carnivores and eat other animal foods, such as mollusks and crustaceans.
If starfish were to disappear from the oceans, other animals would breed excessively and eat more than they normally would. This could lead to an imbalance of the food pyramid because there would be too many herbivores compared to carnivores.
3. Starfish Are Food For Predators
Starfish are food for many types of predators such as sea turtles, frogfish, and other larger fishes like sharks.
The loss of starfish would decrease food for these animals and start competing with their kind to win the right to breed. This could lead to a decrease in marine wildlife population as well as a decrease in diversity.
4. Starfish Help Maintain Water Quality
Starfish help maintains water quality by turning over the sand on the ocean floor to uncover dead algae and animal corpses, which feed small organisms that eventually become food for larger organisms.
If starfish were to disappear, water quality would suffer as there wouldn’t be enough organisms to turn over the sand from the ocean floor. This could lead to an imbalance of nutrients or oxygen levels in the water.
Related Video – Ever Seen a Starfish Gallop?
5. Starfish Are Important For Keeping Coral Reefs Safe
Starfish are important for keeping coral reefs healthy as they eat barnacles and mussels starfish attach themselves to the inside of a coral’s hard exoskeleton.
If starfish were to disappear from our planet’s oceans, coral reefs would be at risk as many organisms would attack them. This leads to a decrease in corals, which is problematic as they provide shelter and food for many types of marine wildlife. Without coral reefs, seafloor diversity will suffer.
6. Starfish Help Maintain Good Water Circulation
Starfish help keep water circulation in good condition by eating jellyfish, sponges, and algae as they create pockets that trap nutrients.
If starfish were to disappear from our planet’s oceans, there would be too much algae growing, and other organisms like barnacles, mussels, and clams would overgrow since their predator wouldn’t be around anymore.
This could lead to an imbalance of oxygen levels as dead algae decaying on the ocean floor produces carbon dioxide gas.
7. Starfish Help Maintain Seaweed Population
Starfish are important for maintaining seaweed populations because they eat everything attached to the ocean floor such as dead algae, animals, and sediment which allows more room on the ocean floor for healthy seaweed growth.
8. Starfish Are A Natural Energy Source
People who live near the ocean know that there is a large supply of free energy located all around them. They can do this by going to their local beach and looking for starfish as they are known to give off enough heat to power a small light bulb for several months at a time.
9. Starfish Can Treat Inflammatory Human Diseases
Starfish may be used as a form of alternative medicine for patients suffering from inflammatory diseases such as arthritis. Extracts of starfish-like Lupeol, Squalene, and Lupetidin can reduce inflammation in the human body.
10. Starfish Can Treat Cancer Cells
Starfish is considered to be a cancer eater by many people. Scientists believe that extracts from starfishes like Lupeol, Squalene, and Lupetidin have properties that kill certain types of cancer cells without harming the healthy neighboring cells.
11. Starfish Can Be Used In Tissue Engineering
Starfish extract may be used as a tissue engineering scaffold which can help in healing wounds of patients. Especially those who have had surgery or have suffered from an accident.
Scaffolds constructed from starfish can also be implanted into the human body to assist damaged tissues to regenerate faster after they are injured. This is yet another way starfish extract can benefit people with certain diseases or medical conditions.
12. Starfish Provide Homes For Smaller Creatures
When this interesting species dies, there are plenty of smaller sea creatures that will find a residence in its body after its death. This is one way that starfish help maintains the ocean’s ecosystem even after death.
13. Starfish Can Remove Toxins From Our Oceans
There are many types of starfish around the world, but not all of them eat plastic like the one in this photo does. Some will help by removing oil slicks or other things that can be harmful if left untouched for too long without any type of clean-up effort taking place.
14. Starfish Keep The Ocean Feasible For Humans To Swim
In some cases, starfish have been known to clean up an area so that it is relatively free from pollution or trash that was thrown into the water by careless people with no respect for nature. In these cases, humans can enjoy themselves in the water without having to worry.
So, next time you see a starfish don’t be afraid it won’t hurt you but keep the ocean clean for you to swim.
15. Starfish Can Be A Delicacy
Starfish is a delicacy in many countries and it is prepared by frying, baking, or boiling the sea creature. The taste of a starfish is not very different from that of a shrimp.
The Importance Of Starfish – Conclusion
Through this article, you must have understood why starfish are important for us and our oceans. Starfishes have been around for a long time and there are many species in existence today. Starfishes will likely continue to survive and help our planet’s ecosystems stay balanced and healthy for years to come.
References
- https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/invertebrates/facts/starfish-1
- https://www.cmu.edu/bme/News_Events/story_archive/dahl-future-of-human-healing.html
- https://edepot.wur.nl/330841
