The sting is rarely deadly to people, but the pain is said to be excruciating and can last for hours. Their tentacles can grow up to 100 feet long. Photo of a Portuguese man o' war floating along in the ocean. It is these tentacles that are armed with microscopic stinging capsules, known as nematocysts, which are loaded which barbed tubes of venom. Underneath the waterline, these floating air sacs join with long strands of colorful tentacles and polyps that can grow to over 100 feet. "Most were within an inch and half lengthwise." These floats can be up to 6 inches tall, although Larkin said that the largest floats she saw were only about 2 inches. Portuguese Man O' War have a distinctive, sail-shaped float-which is said to resemble 18 th-century Portuguese warships, hence their name-that allows them to float along on the ocean currents, like small waterborne balloons. "They were mostly sitting where the high tide marks in little groups, usually sitting around other shells and debris. "When we saw them, they were definitely dead," Larkin said. The National Ocean Service (NOAA) splits these into four distinct categories: floating, capturing prey, feeding and reproducing. Rather, they consist of a colony of genetically identical clones, each of which is specialized to carry out a specific function.
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