Giant Basket Star

A brittle-star relative that spends daylight hours coiled into a tight ball on a gorgonian or sponge, then unfurls a spectacular network of branching arms after dark to filter zooplankton from the current — one of the signature sights of a Caribbean night dive. Each of its five primary arms subdivides repeatedly into hundreds of finer branches, forming a net far wider than the animal's central disc.

Gorgonians and sponges on current-exposed reef, typically visible after dark

Nocturnal filter feeder; coils tightly onto its perch by day and unfurls a branching arm net at night