Banded sea urchin

Indlela yokusibona

• It has a slightly oval shell (test) about 5 cm across.1
• It has two kinds of spines: short, slender spines that run from yellow to dark, and longer, thicker spines that are often banded with light and dark colour.1
• The longer spines reach 10 to 15 cm and can be blunt and hollow.1
• Five bare zones in a star pattern show on the middle of the shell, and these can look blue.1

Ivamise ukudidaniswa ne: Dark forms can look like Diadema setosum or Diadema savignyi. Diadema savignyi is bigger, more uniformly black, and has five white spots on top of its shell and an orange ring around its anus. The most common mix-up is Echinothrix diadema, which can have banded spines when young. Echinothrix diadema has a very small, all-black anal papilla and blue-sheened spines, and its spines do not crush easily, unlike the spines of the banded sea urchin.1