What else is the Portuguese Man Of War known as?
The Portuguese Man o’ War (Physalia physalis), also known as the blue bubble, blue bottle, man-of-war, or the Portuguese man of war, is a jelly-like, marine invertebrate of the family Physaliidae, order Siphonophora, class Hydrozoa, and phylum Cnidaria. The common name comes from a Portuguese war ship type of the 15th and 16th century, the man-of-war (named caravela-portuguesa in Portuguese, caravel), which had triangular sails similar in outline to the bladder of the Portuguese Man O’ War. They are commonly but erroneously thought of and referred to as a jellyfish. In fact, a Portuguese Man O’ War is not a single animal, but rather a siphonophore – a colony of four kinds of minute, highly modified individuals, which are specialized polyps and medusoids. Each such zooid in these pelagic colonial hydroids or hydrozoans has a high degree of specialization and, although structurally similar to other solitary animals, are all attached to each other and physiologically integrated rather tha
