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Rare starfish discovered on Saipan
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Posted on Apr 23 2002
The CNMI’s marine monitoring team has discovered on the Saipan Lagoon, a kind of starfish that is rare to the Marianas, which, if they become in abundance, would make an underwater tourist attraction on the island.
The starfish, which has a diameter of 25 centimeters or close to a foot, is dark purple in color that has bright yellowish scales at the belly.
“It’s a very odd seastar,” said John Starmer, a marine biologist at the Coastal Resources Management Office.
Starmer said the starfish is believed to be Pentaceraster cf. multispinus, a specie that is rare to the Marianas. He said he is in the process of verifying this.
He said this is the first time that such kind of starfish was found on the Saipan Lagoon. Another one was earlier found on the waters of Guam.
“It’s rare to the Marianas. As far as we know, that’s only the second one that’s been found. As far as we know, that’s the first time that it has been found here in the CNMI,” Starmer said.
He added, though, that the specie is found in other areas of the Pacific.
“A lot of the argument for protecting our environment is we’d like to see a diversity of things,” Starmer said. He added that diversity of life forms on the lagoon would make a tourist attraction, since this is one of Saipan’s selling points to visitors.
“The reason people like to go to the forest is because there’s lots of things — there’s lots of plants, there’s lots of birds. If you want to go to the beach, there’s lots of things going on,” he said.
The starfish was found while the CNMI’s marine monitoring team was conducting surveys on fish habitats within the lagoon, as part of the Saipan Lagoon Habitat Assessment Project. The project is being undertaken jointly by the CRMO and the Division of Environmental Quality.
Starmer had kept the discovered specie at the CRMO to study it. “We still do not know what exactly it is,” he added.
