Portuguese Man-of-War Navigator

The man-of-war floats on a gas-filled, blue to pink, translucent body called a 'float'. Above this there is a crest (only a few inches tall) that acts like a sail, moving the animal across the seas. It is the sail that gives the man-of-war its name, because it resembles old Portuguese warships.

Clusters of polyps anchor the tentacles under the float. There are 3 types of polyps: dactylozooid (that find and catch prey with poisonous stingers called nematocysts), gonozooid (that reproduce), and gastrozooid (that digest food, like a stomach).

The coiled, stinging tentacles can be up to 50m (165 feet) long.