If you raise a bunch of clones is their biological clock reset when they split? Or are they simply a continuation of the lifespan of the original adult?
They tend to be long-lived, if you can keep predators away. Of the several scientific papers that I have read that tracked anemones in the wild, their rates of mortality were greatly affected by whether or not they had clownfish, and whether they were located in deeper, rockier environments, versus shallow, sandier areas. Though they CAN potentially live for decades, the reality is that it is rare for them to do so... at least in the field studies I have seen.
It reminds me of some captive fish stories from when I used to work at the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago. They had a captive tarpon there that was in excess of 70 years old. This old fish had lost an eye somewhere along the way, and was slow and lethargic, but he had obviously survived in captivity for many years longer than he would have in the wild.
For people who are producing anemone clones via asexual reproduction (primarily E. quadricolor), it raises the interesting question of where one "life" begins and another ends
The short answer: no one really knows how old anemones MIGHT be... just that field studies show they die at a pretty decent rate and need high levels of reproduction to maintain population densities.
One wonders why we are not overwhelmed by infinite anemones... since they continue to sexually and asexually reproduce profusely and can live forever
Mother Nature tends to balance things pretty well. High rates of reproduction typically coincide with high rates of mortality. While a mouse MIGHT be able to live 20 years in captivity before it dies of old age, the average life of a mouse in the wild tends to be brutish and short
For some reason, the fact that anemones don't age the way humans do has created a lot of hype in the media. Anemones are not unique in their ability to potentially lead very long lives - corals, jellyfish, worms, and probably other critters have the ability to regenerate indefinitely, regrow complete bodies from body parts, replace old cells with new, and most importantly - maintain DNA length during cell replication even after the organism has reached maturity (this is where we humans break down). However I don't see anyone running news stories about our need to protect worms because some could actually be "centuries" old
). We don't know what the actual settlement rate for corals in the wild is, but it's quite possible that perhaps 90% martality happens within the first 3-6 months - at least, that's what we see in captivity, and might be even more in the wild (98-99%).
Many news articles that I read on this subject seem to make the mistake - because an anemone CAN live to be 100 years of age, when you see an anemone on a reef it IS 100 years of age. Field studies on anemone mortality and expected lifespan do not bear this out...
Life can not always be explained using a **** sapiens model. People seem excited about "immortal anemones" because they think of immortality on human terms. For an anemone, it is just another day in the life... where it COULD live to be 1000 years old, but it is highly unlikely that it will live to be 10
definition of aging. I just finished reading The Secret Life of Lobsters and now have a newfound respect for them!
Sadly, this study got wide distribution and is used as a source for many of the secondary articles I have seen. 5000 year-old Bristlecone pines are VERY rare and should be protected. But that doesn't mean there aren't TONS of younger trees, or that you can't propagate an almost infinite number of them, if you are so inclined. Potential for old age does not necessarily mean "rare" "fragile" or "low fecundity" (word of the day )
