{"id":201448,"date":"2026-03-12T14:28:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-12T14:28:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/201448\/"},"modified":"2026-03-12T14:28:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-12T14:28:07","slug":"blue-dragons-are-showing-up-on-south-texas-beaches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/201448\/","title":{"rendered":"Blue dragons are showing up on South Texas beaches"},"content":{"rendered":"

CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas \u2013 There are dragons at the beach in Texas. They\u2019re not fire-breathing, but they do pack a punch.<\/p>\n

Jace Tunnell with the Harte Research Institute posted images of the blue dragons on Facebook<\/a> on Tuesday, saying he found around 20 in a short stretch of the beach at North Padre Island and Mustang Island.<\/p>\n

Blue glaucus, known more commonly as a blue dragon, is a type of nudibranch or sea slug.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese tiny creatures are absolutely stunning \u2014 but do NOT touch them,” the Facebook post reads.<\/p>\n

They feed on Portuguese man o\u2019 war and store the man o\u2019 war\u2019s stinging cells.<\/p>\n

They \u201cconcentrate\u201d the cells, meaning \u201ctheir sting can be extremely painful,\u201d Tunnell wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven when washed up on the beach, they can still sting,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

>> Heading to a beach for spring break? These are areas in Texas that have elevated levels of fecal matter<\/a><\/p>\n

The post adds that, along with blue dragons, strong winds are also bringing in Portuguese man o\u2019 wars, blue buttons, by-the-wind sailors and purple sea snails. <\/p>\n

Tunnell says oceanographers sometimes call this group the \u201cBlue Wave.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a previous interview with KSAT, Tunnell said he recognized the sea slugs after the May 2020 reports of blue dragons on the beach at Padre Island National Seashore.<\/p>\n

PINS park officials also told KSAT at the time that the sea slugs were a rare find.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe ocean is amazing\u2026 but sometimes the most beautiful creatures come with a sting,” Tunnell said in Tuesday\u2019s post.<\/p>\n

Blue dragon found at Mission-Aransas Reserve. (Jace Tunnell)Related:<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 by KSAT – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas \u2013 There are dragons at the beach in Texas. They\u2019re not fire-breathing, but they do…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":201449,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[244,6527,62201,1006,3873,27,29,28],"class_list":["post-201448","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-animals","tag-ksatkids","tag-mustang-island","tag-outdoors","tag-padre-island","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201448","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=201448"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/201448\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/201449"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=201448"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=201448"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=201448"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}