Slanted Science

Quite possibly the most awesome piece of natural-world photography has been posted on YouTube. It features – of course! – His Majesty Sir David Attenborough, a man for whom our respect knows no bounds.

Check out the video after the jump…

The BBC boffins used hi-definition time-lapse photography to capture the scenes; the footage comes from a show currently being aired on the BBC in the UK. It shows in beautiful detail the sequence of events which unfold as roving bands of carnivorous nemertean worms and sea stars descend upon a dead seal and proceed to gorging.

The worms are first inside, having “a snout like a harpoon“. The sea stars have to work a bit harder to get at their food, because “they feed by pushing out their stomachs through their mouths“. Which sounds a lot like us after a particularly tough Saturday night.

Sadly, the BBC does not allow us to embed the video itself on here, so we have instead provided a link to the clip on YouTube.

With no further ado, here it is. After it, we’ve linked to David Attenborough’s marvellous body of work on Amazon.com. You really should check it out if you haven’t already.