MONTEREY, Calif. - Hundreds of miles of water make up the Monterey Bay, but a carnivorous sponge?
"I'd imagine there would be a lot of seashells and calcite that's what usually forms on ocean floors," said Jose Hernandez, a 16-year-old from the San Francisco Bay area.
Thousands species live above the water and we even know about some that kind of hang out in both, like the sea lions here at the Monterey wharf, but do we really know what's beneath the surface? Researchers found a sponge that actually eats meat.
Researchers at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in Moss Landing found the carnivorous sponge two miles under the water in the Monterey Bay Canyon and aquarium visitors were shocked.
"That's amazing, I'm not aware of that, its kind of interesting and terrifying too," Sam Kambdar, from Indiana, told me.
And Kevin Roberts, from Amwater, California said, "Maybe we could find a huge octopus or something. I think I want to stay away from the sponges."
The sponge is being called the harp sponge because of its shape and is one not like any other. It eats crustaceans that float by in the ocean's currents.
Researchers say there's no way to put a number on the different species because they've just scratched the surface.
